


Fall of Justice

by MHMacedo



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman (Movies - Nolan), DC Animated Universe, DC Cinematic Universe, DCU, DCU (Comics), Gotham Central, Harley Quinn (Comics), Supergirl (Comics), Supergirl (TV 2015), Superman - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-06
Updated: 2016-11-05
Packaged: 2018-08-13 09:29:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 21
Words: 30,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7971796
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MHMacedo/pseuds/MHMacedo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A calculated series of tragedies have befallen Kara Danvers, now her Cousin Kal EL and his good friend Bruce Wayne will join forces in search of those responsible. </p><p>Are they tearing his plans apart, or following a trap laid out for them?</p><p>This work will be 21 chapters in total</p><p> </p><p> </p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Girl in The Dark

Arkham sat in gloom, its walls darkened by the rain, its silence broken only by the solemn hum of rolling thunder. This, it seemed to Bruce, was the only state in which he ever found the building. He watched the structure from the back of his town car, the tapping rain giving him a brief sense of comfort, one which he knew would soon be entirely forgotten.  
“Keep it running,” he told his driver as he stepped out. Though he wished the visit would last the night, he knew it would be take no longer than a few minutes.  
Inside, he knew the drill better than most, though the front door was not his usual way in. Bruce lay his watch, phone and keys on the tray as the awestruck rookie guard watched in silent amazement, the most popular man in Gotham in the darkest of its corners, a sight to behold.  
“Thank you Mr. Wayne, I’ll keep these safe for you,” said the young guard as the older one shook his head and rolled his eyes. Bruce nodded and was led by the older man down the pale corridor to the the room at the opposite end.  
“She hasn’t shown any signs of violence but, I can stay close if you want,” the guard said.  
“It’s alright, I’ll be okay,” Bruce replied. The guard signaled to the rookie who pressed a button at the guard-station. A loud buzz rang through the hall and the guard pulled open the door. Bruce stepped inside and in another moment, he was alone.  
“Hello Kara,” he said in a soft tone. The girl lay on the bed beside him, her once blond hair now falling in light brown ropes over her face. She had not seen sunlight in months. “Did you get the basket I sent?” he asked as he sat down at her desk. Though the sorrowful ambience of Arkham could not be entirely done away with, Bruce had, over the past ninety days, anonymously sent things to help bring some normalcy to her world and add whatever little cheer he could to her room. Though she wasn’t allowed pencils, he had been given her paper and charcoal to draw, one of her many hobbies when she was younger, or so he had been told, along with posters, books and even a small plastic keyboard.  
But the posters remain rolled up in the corner, the books in a pile on the desk, the keyboard in its case. Before this, he had met her only once, not as Bruce Wayne, but as Batman.  
He had called Superman, his long time friend, for help, but as often has been the case, Superman had his own problems to deal with, and so he sent his cousin, Supergirl. She had been full of life, bringing with her a sense of humor her cousin was not lucky enough to share, and though not exactly graceful, she had great strength of character, a natural desire to do good and the innocent confusion only the young possess.  
Bruce had greatly enjoyed their time together, and Kara, who had been starstruck at meeting the Dark Knight, showed nothing but humility at the end of their experience, which had led to non-other than capturing the Joker himself.  
Ever since, Bruce had sent her birthday presents and Christmas cards, as he wasn’t sure how else to show his gratitude. And then, after two years of peace, Joker escaped from Arkham. The details of his escape were never completely understood. Some guards say there were supernatural elements to what happened that night while others insist it was an inside job. After an investigation, Bruce had more questions than answers. And even more so once the Joker made no attempts to come after him as he had expected. There were no bombs, no games, nothing from the Harlequin. Until there was, but not in the way he had been expecting. Bruce had heard about it too late. By the time had knew, the girl was already shattered. Ruined in all but flesh.  
“Is there anything you need?” he asked, but she remained silent. For months he had been conducting his investigation without ever wanting to involve her. But after all those days, all those hours with nothing to show for it, no clues leading to Joker, he had to come, he had to ask, because Kara Danvers had been the last person to see him.  
“Is there anything you can tell me? Please Kara, I won’t come back if you don’t want it. Or I’ll come every day. Whatever you want, you’ll have it. I have to stop him.”  
She lay with her eyes open but distant, looking but seeing nothing. She remained silent. He waited then finally he stood. “You should get some sun. When you’re ready,” he said. Outside time was allowed once a day but she had never taken advantage of it. Bruce wasn’t sure if he wanted her to. Without the sun her power had diminished, and in her state, he thought maybe that was a good thing, but after seeing her, he changed his mind, she looked withered, pale. He finally understood why Clark came back from visiting her with such sorrow in his eyes.  
“Goodbye Kara,” Bruce said as he moved to the door.  
“There was...” she began, her voice small, weak, as if it had been kept in a box too long. He turned back to her and waited. “That last day, before Clark brought me to Gotham, there was someone there... it looked like Clark but wasn’t.”  
He waited for more but that was all he was going to get. “Thank you,” he told her.  
“Are you going to kill him?” she asked, finally raising her eyes to meet his.  
“I don’t kill people,” he said. “But I’ll put him away. She dropped her eyes again, staring at nothing.  
“I will... if you don’t. I’ll kill him.”


	2. The Penthouse of Solitude

Clark watched as the night was split by thin gold rays of sunlight that burned silent between skyscrapers. He still wasn’t used to living in a penthouse apartment, it felt cold, mechanical compared to the farm where he’d grown up, but he was grateful to Bruce for providing it. Though Gotham’s skyline was just as foreign as the apartment, he was more than glad to be somewhere safe, somewhere he and Lois could live without fear of being seen.  
“You always wake up before the sun, farm boy?” Lois asked as she entered the livingroom. He turned to find her wrapped head to toe, only her face visible beneath the comforter cloak.   
“Actually, yeah. And, you can turn the heat on you know,” he smiled.   
“It’s Bruce’s place, it would feel like stealing.”  
“I hate that you feel like that. Maybe we should go back.”  
“Metropolis isn’t safe for us right now, hell neither’s Gotham but at least we have this place,” she said.   
“I don’t want you to feel like you’re trapped.”  
“Well I am trapped, but hey if you’re gonna be housebound it’s not a bad gig to be in a place with a jacuzzi.”   
“I’m serious.”  
“So am I. I’m fine, trust me,” she moved close to him and rested her head on his chest. “If things aren’t working, I’ll tell you.”  
Her eyes found his, beneath his forced smile there was only worry. He ran a thumb across the newly healed scar on her neck. She took his hand in hers. “I’m so-” he began.  
“Don’t,” she interrupted. “It’s not your fault. It’s not even hers. And it doesn’t hurt anymore, so stop worrying, and stop looking at me like I’m a china doll you have to keep from cracking. I’m fine. It’s you I’m worried about. When’s the last time you slept the entire night?”  
“With your snoring? Fours years ago?” he smiled, a genuine one this time. She lightly punched his chest, even so it hurt her knuckle.   
A quick rap on the door and Clark was halfway across the room. He looked through the peephole and sighed. He opened the door. “Wait!” Lois said as she tried without success to duck out of the room. Bruce Wayne stood awkward at the threshold.   
“Hi Lois,” he said, giving her a quick wave. She turned, her blanket cocoon making it difficult to navigate.   
“There’s pie...” she said. He declined and with that she shuffled out of view.  
Clark stepped aside, Bruce wandered in. “Problem with the heat?” Bruce asked.  
“Problem with the tenants. What’s wrong, you looked worried.”  
“I went to see Kara last night, I know- I’m supposed to leave her out of it, but... she talked to me Clark.”  
“She did?” Clark felt a rush of joy followed closely followed by a sting of jealousy. Why had she not been speaking to him but she would talk to Bruce? This was immediately followed by a wave of guilt, courtesy of his upbringing. “What did she say?” he asked.  
“She saw something... saw you actually, but it wasn’t you. She didn’t say much more but I don’t think it was a hallucination. I called her psychiatrist- who wasn’t happy to be woken in the night, she said hallucinations wouldn’t match her state of mind, now or before we brought her in.”  
“What else could it have been?”  
“I’m not sure but, but it’s a lead. After all this time, at least it’s something.”  
Clark turned his attention to the sun again. The rays were finally reaching the window, he could feel the warmth soaking through his skin. “How is she?” he asked.  
Bruce hesitated. “...She needs more care, more therapy. She was talking about killing the Joker--”  
“Maybe she should." Clark said the words without thinking. Bruce was at a loss, Clark noticed. He had never said anything of the kind, he could practically see Bruce’s disapproval.   
“You can’t let him get to you, I know it’s impossible but you’re a hero for more than your strength, you have to be more than what he wants. You're a weapon Clark, whether you like it or not, and if you can’t keep yourself in control, you'll be his weapon.”   
Clark pulled his eyes from Bruce. “Thanks for letting me know.”   
“You don’t want to dig into this? It’s the only clue we’ve gotten in months.”  
“I need to be here, with Lois.”  
“You know she wouldn’t like you using her as an excuse.”  
“They still suspect me... they don’t trust me,” said Clark, his eyes on the world below.  
Bruce nodded and moved to the door. “Don’t let that pie go to waste.” He said before leaving.  
Alone, Clark released the fist he’d been making without realizing. He took a deep breath and let it out in a shaky sigh. There was an anger inside him, one which had always been there. Even as he grew up in a perfectly pleasant home, there had been rage, a sense of loss and indignation at what he could not get back. He never understood how it could be so strong, if all that he had lost happened before he could remember, but now, as things had begun to fall apart, he was afraid it would come out in one way or another, he was afraid it was true, he was a weapon.

#

In the other room Lois lay in bed about to fall asleep when a wave of nausea bubbled from her stomach. She ran to the bathroom and vomited just in time to make it in the toilet. She caught her breath, shocked at what just happened, especially since she hadn’t thrown up since she was in high school. She knew she wasn’t sick, she didn’t have a fever...   
“Oh shit,” she said.


	3. Mother's Flowers

Hours after lights out, Kara sat awake, the screams and calls of Arkham’s mad residents echoing through the halls outside her room. And she was one of them. Though she kept quiet, her oncoming lunacy was beyond doubt. Each day she grew weaker without the sun, not only in body but in mind, and yet, the thought of going outside, going anywhere weighed so heavy on her chest that it became hard to breathe.   
As she sat there listening to their shouting, she would remember. She tried to push the memories away but they wouldn’t let her rest.  
As she tore past white clouds on her way to her adoptive mother’s house some months prior, Kara blew past the speed of sound for the first time-- a sonic boom rumbling somewhere behind her. Joker had killed her friends starting with Jimmy Olsen, the young photojournalist who she was beginning to develop feelings for and who had been her first kiss. He had been found floating in the ocean in the early dawn hours of a Sunday morning, the morning after they had admitted their feelings for each other, the morning after she kissed him. A message had been carved into his forehead; “XOXO.”  
For weeks following, more and more people she knew were found all across Metropolis, their bodies cut, beaten, even as she tried to hide them and Superman came to help, the person committing these crimes somehow got the upper hand, as if he knew what they would do even before they did.  
But that day, Kara was determined to win. She would fly to her adoptive mother’s home and have Clark take her somewhere neither of them had thought about, some place he would discover along the way. She was relieved to find that their Kansas home was still intact, the yard was clean and the garden full of color and bloom. The flowers always made her smile, to her they meant safety, comfort, they meant home. Clark was already there in his suit and tie, she knew he was faster than her but didn’t realize how much until she saw him standing at the driveway with his arms crossed and a smile on his face.  
“Kara,” her mother said in surprise as she flew inside from the second floor window.   
“Mom, come one, Kal’s downstairs, he’s going to take you somewhere safe.”  
Her mother threw her arms around the girl. Kara held back her tears but it was all she could do not to fall apart in her mother’s embrace. Her mother knew about what was happening, and she knew there was nothing to be done, the only thing a mother could do in a time like this was whatever it took to make her daughter happy, and so she nodded and didn’t argue.   
Kara looked out the window and called to Clark, “Check the car, make sure it’s safe.”   
“We’re taking the car?” her mother asked behind her.   
“Yes, he’ll find another one along the way, it’s the best way to make sure you’re not being followed or tracked. A flying man versus a man in a car, one blends in, the other doesn’t.”  
Her mother nodded and kissed her cheek, then ran downstairs. Kara remained, her eyes tightly shut, she didn’t even want to see which way the car was headed.   
A sound broke her concentration. The sound of something tearing across the atmosphere. Kara turned and looked to the sky, something was coming but she couldn’t see what.  
“Go! Now!” She screamed to her mother who ran into the car with Clark. Kara flew out as the speeding thing came like a bullet towards her, she focused her vision as much as possible and then, it became clear, it was Superman.  
She looked down to the car beneath her, Clark smiled from the front seat, his eyes shined green. She broke for the car-- a wave of heat and ripped past her, debris and flame filling the air.   
Kara hammered to the ground, but it was too late. The fire burned at her feet, her mother’s flowers wilted black. The driver’s seat was empty, as if no one had been there at all. Her mother’s body burned on the other side.  
An intrusive thought would often come to her in the night as she tried to sleep, it would burrow in her subconscious and stir until she couldn’t fight it any longer and finally gave it room to thrive. That thought was this; there was only one silver lining to every tragedy, once it ended, it ended forever. When you lose everyone you love, everything you've ever known, the one good thing is knowing that it can never happen again. But for her, it did.   
She lost everyone in Krypton. Parents, relatives, friends. But year after year, things got better. She began to laugh again, to enjoy her days as she thought she never would. She was even cared for by people who loved her like she was their own daughter.   
And then, one by one, they were taken from her. Her friends disappeared in the night only to be found later, their bodies bruised and torn. There was no moving on from this. Kara Zor-El lived in darkness, her world was ashes. Death was the only constant. She was not afraid to die. And now, she feared, she was not afraid to kill.


	4. Curse at Arkham Asylum

Dick Grayson surveyed his old haunt with a smile, the Batcave glistened, its black walls wet with fresh mist from the waterfall which hid it from the world. He was glad to be on his own now, no longer a part of team, no longer taking orders, but he had to admit, he missed being here, or at the very least, felt a nice nostalgic tug at being back, after all, he had grown up here.   
“Nightwing,” Bruce called from behind his computer. “I like the new suit.”  
“You can call me Dick, that’s what I call you.”  
Bruce smiled. “It’s good to see you.”  
“I’m sorry I missed the funeral. If it wasn’t life or death I would have been here. Alfred was like a father to me.”   
Dick could see a twinge of sadness in Bruce, but it only lasted a second. “We all have things to deal with in this line of work, you don’t have to apologize.”  
“How can I help?”   
“Magic,” said Bruce. Dick joined him at the desk, photos of voodoo rituals, ghost sightings and abandoned witchcraft materials littered every screen. “I have one lead on the Joker but I can’t narrow it down. Something happened with Kara, something she can’t explain. But I need more information.”  
“I want to help but I’m not sure where I come in here... I know nothing about magic, I don’t even know if I believe in it.”  
“Me neither. I want you to talk to her, get more out of her. There must be some detail--”  
“Me? Now? It’s the middle of the night, and I barely know the girl, get Clark--”  
“That’s why I need you. Because you barely know her. I think she needs a friendly face but not an intrusive one. Clark is too close to her and I’m--”  
“Like a cop who wants to be her friend,” Dick said, no sign of sarcasm in his voice.  
“Exactly. And yes, now.”  
“Alright, I’ll go,” he kept his eyes on the monitors. “What did she say happened?”  
“She was fooled by something.”  
“Fooled?” Dick asked. “Who could fool Supergirl?”

#

The overnight at Arkham was always a tossup, nine out of ten times it was quiet. Not literally, the moans and groans, the night terror screams and laughs from delightful dreams was a constant current that ran through the place, day or night. But at least there were no fights. The residents had no cause to come out of their rooms which meant a much smaller chance of trouble. All Tim had to do in his shift was run checks, making sure everyone was where they were meant to be.   
This particular night Tim had a headache he couldn’t shake even after four aspirins. The pain was concentrated at the top of his forehead, like something was trying to drill its way into his brain.   
“Tim?” another orderly said as he tapped Tim’s shoulder.   
“What?” Tim asked.  
“What you don’t hear me talking? It’s your turn to do checks.”  
“Oh, okay,” Tim said, taking the clipboard from his colleague. He had been at a fifteen minute break which had ended in what felt like thirty seconds. But as he checked the clock he realized he’s gone over by three minutes. It must be a flu he thought, as he went out to the hall.   
One door stood out to him over the others. It was at the end of the hall, it should have been the last door he went to, but rather, for some reason, he felt he needed to go there, he had to check on the occupant whose name he couldn’t remember.   
The door marked K. Danvers stood like an invitation just waiting to be opened. He took his key and put it in the lock even though he could see her lying there, crying softly to herself. The check was done, “BD” was all he had to write. Bed. She was in bed. So why was he opening her door?   
Even though he was quiet entering the room, she seemed to hear him and sighed a breath of frustration and embarrassment. She wiped her face but kept her back to him.   
“I wasn’t doing anything,” she said. “I’m in bed liked I’m supposed to be.”  
Tim moved moved over her and looked down. She lay like a present that needed to be opened, a sudden desire to see the red beneath her skin suddenly rising inside him, but it wasn’t time yet.   
“You think we’ve taken everything from you, but there’s so much more,” he said. He wasn’t sure where the words were coming from but they felt right, they felt good to say. The girl turned to him finally, her cheeks flushed red, her eyes puffy with tears.  
“What?”  
“You will lose everything. Even him.”  
The girl sat up, looking at Tim behind a furrowed brow. And now, finally, it was time. He wrapped his hand around the knife tucked into the waste of his pants, a knife he didn’t remember putting there. He swung before she had the time to reacted-- the blade skating across her neck. He wanted to see the blood, wanted to feel its warmth, but there was none.   
She rose with a hop, pushing both arms against his chest. Before he knew what’d happened he was across the room, his back stinging, his lungs desperate for air.  
She remained where she was, her chest rising and falling in great waves. She didn’t know what to do, what to say, she only stared. But Tim wanted blood. He stood though his ribs were cracked and his hips broken. The pain seared through him, feeding his hatred. He rushed to her again, knife raised.   
He could see it in her eyes, the panic and confusion, but it turned to something else by the time he reached her. He spiked the blade down-- she caught his wrist, stopping him like a vice, her fingers squeezed as hard as they could and though his bones didn’t break, he could feel his nerves being crushed. She wasn’t scared anymore, she was angry.  
She other hand jetted to his neck and a moment later he had no air coming to his brain. The girl screamed wild and fierce. And then, he remembered her name. Kara. The quiet one, the one who he’d smile at when he brought her a cup of water in the middle of the night, filled to the brim with ice, that’s how she liked it.   
Why was he here? Why was he trying to hurt one of the only residents he actually enjoyed seeing every night? How had he forgotten her name?   
His world began to dim. Kara wasn’t letting go, she wasn’t even thinking about it. Her eyes were wild with fury. Tim stopped fighting. There was nothing left in him. He could hear the shuffling of guards running down the hall. But there was no hope in him, no thought of tomorrow. Only the cold of the dark that fell over him as he looked into her raging blue eyes. He thought of the girl he was supposed to meet for breakfast after work, he thought of her sitting there waiting for him. He hated the idea that she would think he stood her up. There was a flash of green. It hadn’t happened in the world, only through his eyes. Kara’s rage gave way to confusion again. Whatever it was, she had seen it too. She pulled her hands from his neck but it was too late. The room went black. The other orderlies screamed as they burst inside, their voices like buried echoes deep under the ocean. Sound and sight faded, and then, nothing.


	5. Bazooka

Floodlights pierced the falling rain, the alarm rose and fell into the night, police cruisers crowded the shattered gates-- their red and blue lights beating against the metal spears that marked the entrance to Arkham.   
Kara saw it dissolving behind her, she heard their voices all at once, orders being given, yes sirs and no sirs, like one big jumble of noise. Her hearing had been subdued in Arkham, walls and doors between every resident. Out here there was nothing to stop it all from flooding in. She had learned to control it before but now there was no stopping it. For control she needed concentration but there was no time, she had to keep running.   
She found an alley, a dark corner away from the bright tangerine glow of Gotham streetlights. Though the rain had no effect on her, she shivered. Her skin was crawling, her hands trembling. Everything she had grown into over the past few years, her strength, her pride, her independence, stripped from her, undone by madness.   
“Help me...” she whispered as she shrunk into herself, down to ground, a quiet corner by a dumpster. The words she dreaded above all others, the words that, in the start of her time as Supergirl, meant failure and shame, words she would never have uttered in the most dire situation, now the only words that came to her.  
“Kara?”   
She turned to find a silhouette. He stepped closer. Nightwing.   
“What’re you doing here?” she asked.  
“I was coming to visit you at Arkham... bit late I guess.”  
“It’s the middle of the night.”  
“Well I’m not Daywing...” he paused for laughter, there wasn’t any. “What happened?”  
“I was attacked,” she said.   
“Attacked? Come one,” he said, lowering a hand to her. “Let’s get out of here, we’ll go to Bruce’s, or Clark’s, we’ll figure what happened.”  
“I have to find the Joker.”  
“That’s what we all want--”  
“You want to put him away, it doesn’t work, he just comes back. We have to stop it. Stop him.”  
“You’re not a killer, don’t forget that because of one madman--”  
“I killed an orderly... I didn’t want to but he was... there was something making him come after me... his eyes glowed green.”  
“Then it wasn’t your fault, it doesn’t make you a murderer.”  
“I overpowered him. He was down. I didn’t have to kill him...” she said, Nightwing said nothing. “I’m going to find the Joker,” she continued, “...and I’m going to kill him.” She stood, the feeling of helplessness that had overcome her now collapsed beneath the determination and anger that grew beneath her skin. “You can come with me, but don’t don’t stand against me.” She marched past him-- he gripped her arm.   
“Whoa, hey, hold on a second, let’s talk about this...”  
“Get your hand off me,” she said, he did.   
“I don’t want to fight. I just think you need some time. You need rest.”  
She marched on, out of the alley and into the street. She stopped in her tracks. Batman stood in front of her, his body wrapped in armor like she had never seen.   
“What took you so long?” Nightwing said behind them.   
“You were stalling me?” Kara’s anger boiled into rage.   
“No,” said Batman. “We want to help.”   
She felt Batman’s eyes looking down to her, like a judge to a junkie. She faced him. “You caused this. You could have ended it before it began. You let him go. Even after what he did to Barbara.”  
Batman hesitated. “We’re not murderers,” he said, “...we can’t allow ourselves to cross that line.”  
“You have crossed it. My mother, my friends... your hands are red to me. You want absolution, step aside, let me do what you never could.” She moved ahead, Batman stepped in front of her.   
The soft patter of rain filled the empty space between them.   
“Kara please...” he said. She could hear his heartbeat quicken, he was scared. One last time, she tried to walk past Batman without violence-- he took her arm, his metal gauntlets squeezing tight. She knew her strength was at an all time low, down to her cells, she was weaker than she’d ever been before. Yet, she wasn’t about to allow herself to be taken away to be watched and cared for while Joker was allowed to continue his plans and schemes, all the while knowing they would only go as far as putting him behind bar, bars which he most likely already made plans to escape.   
Every night, Kara closed her eyes and saw the death of those she loved, Batman could have stopped it before it began, he didn’t. And now a threat had been made against her cousin, the only family she had left. There was only one option, the Joker had to die, and the man holding her in place had no intention of letting that happen.  
She took Batman by the wrist and squeezed, the metal was strong but it still mostly gave way beneath her fingers, just enough for him to feel it. His jaw locked in pain. Batman reached his other arm to the back of her neck and pulled her down to her knees.  
A bang exploded from behind them as Nightwing fired something she couldn’t see. A rope hooked around her, holding her arms at her sides. She tried to break it as most ropes are no more than string to her, but this material was different. She recognized it as plasma rope, the same kind that was used to pull ships. At her strongest she could likely user her Solar Flare to burn the rope with her eyes, but she had nothing of the sun stored inside her. Still, she wouldn’t give up.  
“Kara, it’s okay--” Nightwing said as he walked up to her from behind. She hopped to her feet, breaking from Batman’s grip and banging her head against his chin, he fell back unconscious. She kicked Batman center-mass and ran, arms still bound.   
Before she could get out of view, somethings stung at her back, a jolt of electricity ripped through her legs, making them fold. She crumbled to the ground.   
Batman struggled to get up in his heavy suit. His chest had been badly bruised by her kick and his wrist fractured. She turned back to him, helpless to stand, and watched as he made his way toward her.   
“Smile!” a voice called out. Kara didn’t recognize it, but she could tell it belonged to a woman, or a girl. She scanned the roof of the nearest building as the voice had seemed to come from above. It was too dark to see, but there was someone there, standing at the edge. Whoever she was, she was holding an RPG. And it was aimed at Batman. “You’re on candid camera!” the mystery woman called before she fired. The grenade whistled across the air, Batman lifted both arms as it exploded against him. Kara felt the thud of the concussive bang slam against her. Batman flew back, his armor smoking.   
“Yazi!” the woman yelled before throwing the weapon down and disappearing from view. Kara stood, the shock from the electricity beginning to fade. She waited. She could hear the banging of a fire escape lowering to the street as the woman made her way down.  
The mystery woman came out from the darkness, her make-up smeared eyes and red lipstick smile taking Kara by surprise. The woman strutted across the street, one hand empty the other swinging a chain. She swung at the unconscious Batman’s face and laughed.  
“Don’t,” said Kara.   
“I saw what he did to you! Oh... you love him huh?”   
“What! No! I just... is he alive?”  
The woman bent down, ears to Batman’s face. “Yep, he’s breathing. The Bat-thing’s tough to kill, believe me I’ve tried before. Hmm, never been this close though,” she pulled a long hunting knife from her belt.   
“No. Please, just forget him.”   
“Hmmmm. Okay. I’m not supposed to anyway. He don’t belong to me.”  
“Who are you?”  
“Harley,” she smiled, “Doctor Harley,” she took a bow.   
“Why did you help me?”  
“We girls gotta look out for each other, these men think they own us. We gotta show ‘em what’s what. But to be fair, mine does own me, but that’s only cause I want ‘im to,” she winked.   
“Okay, well...” Kara began, Harley came to her and unhooked the plasma rope.   
“You’re looking for the Joker?” Harley asked.   
“Yeah. You know him?”  
“He’s an enigma, unknowable in the philosophical sense, but I know the shape of ‘im.”  
“I need to find him.”   
“You want to hurt him...” Harley crossed her arms and looked away.   
“You’re... into the Joker?” Kara asked.   
“He’s my puddin’...” she pouted. “We had a disagreement, I thought we should be together forever, he disagreed. I need him to love me again, he already does, he just don’t see it as good as me. I’ll make you a deal, let me take you to him as my hostage, you’re friends with the bat, he’ll like you as a hostage. Then he’ll take me back, but you can’t kill him. What do you say? Pals?” Harley held her hand out, Kara took it. They shook.   
“Where is he?”  
“I’ll take you there, can’t have you ditching me, not that you would but, you know, it’s been known to happen, even the nicest people find it hard to be with me for prolonged periods of time, who knows why, just one of the many mysteries of the universe.”  
“Alright,” Kara sighed, preparing herself for the journey. Harley took the handle of her knife and slammed it against the window of a parked car. She reached inside and opened the door. “Take shotgun, I’m driving!” Harley got behind the wheel and smiled wide. Kara got in. As they peeled off she took one last look at Batman as he grew smaller and smaller in the distance.  
“Where’d you get an RPG?” Kara asked.  
“You really never heard of me, huh?”


	6. Smile

Sparks trailed behind the ‘91 Mitsubishi Mirage whose half fallen bumper scratched the blacktop as Harley weaved around slow motorists and city busses, cackling all the while. Kara held tight, though she knew she couldn’t get hurt in a car accident and she’d flown much faster than this before, she still found it incredibly off-putting.  
“You okay hun,” Harley began, “...you look like you’re about to lose your lunch.”  
“Just a bit nauseous, I’ll be okay.”  
“You want I should go faster?” Harley asked, pushing her feet down hard on the accelerator.   
“Yeah that should help,” said Kara sarcastically.   
“I like cut of your jib,” Harley laughed.  
But as much as the movement and jerks weren’t her preferred way of driving, Kara knew her nausea wasn’t motion sickness. She was growing more and more lethargic by the minute. Something was wrong.  
“You wanna postpone it? Joker’s not going anywhere. He’s a homebody,” Harley told her.  
“No. I wanna to find him tonight.”  
Harley’s brow furrowed as she studied the Kara who seemed to be losing her color. A car honked and swerved as it passed, Harley had drifted into the opposite lane without noticing. “Watch it bozo!” she screamed as she turned the steering wheel right, tires squealing, smoking rising white. “I can’t wait to tell Mistah J ‘bout our fight with the bat, I saw you kick him down like pow! And then I came in and boom! He’s gonna love it! I meant to ask, how does a girl get to get a kick like yours? You eat a lot of spinach? ‘Cause I hate spinach.”  
“I-- it was just luck I guess.”  
“I’m just messing with you little blue, I know who you are, I may be crazy but I’m not stupid. I saw what you did, where you been these last three months?”  
“I don’t really...” Kara began, then she realized they were taking the bridge. “We’re leaving the city?”  
“What, you think just because he’s the Joker means he can’t have nice things?” Harley said. On the other side of the bridge, the buildings gave way to trees, apartment buildings to houses. “People make all their money in the city then invest it all outside of it, leaving nothing for the rest. That’s Crest Hill,” Harley pointed to a beautiful green hill lined with mansions. “Bruce Wayne lives there, another aristocrat who makes all his money in town then comes here to the safety of his mansion.”  
“Is that where we’re going?” Kara asked, her heart starting to race.   
“Why would we go there? No, no, Mistah J’s a modest fellow, he wanted something comfortable but not flashy...” she began as they pulled in front of a well cared for colonial residence. “...something homey.”   
“The joker lives here?” Kara asked, surprised.   
“He’s subletting.”   
They got out of the car and moved to the front door, Harley bent over and picked up a key from beneath a potted plant on the porch and walked inside. Kara was still feeling weak but she knew she could beat the Joker, he was only a man. She had decided she wouldn’t give him a chance to speak. Everyone he could use as leverage against her was already gone and the others were safe. She followed Harley into the doorway but stopped before entering. The house was entirely black and her powers were too diminished for her to be able to see through the walls.  
“What’s the matter hun?” Harley asked as she disappeared inside.   
“Turn the lights on.”  
“Afraid of the dark?” Harley asked. Silence followed. The house lit up. Harley stood in the hall after having flipped the main three light switches. “Well?”  
Kara went inside. The house was quiet but clean. She moved past Harley toward the living room.   
“I think I know what’s been making you so sick,” Harley said. “It’s my perfume.”  
“I didn’t smell anything in the car,” Kara told her as she entered the livingroom. A man dressed in a shirt and tie sat on the couch, his body bound by rope, his mouth gagged. He looked up at her, eyes wide with fear.   
“It’s odorless,” Harley said behind her. Kara turned-- a green mist filled the air in front of her. Harley held the bottle in her hand. She smiled. “Kryptacular I call it, made from all natural Kryptonite. Hard to get but I know a guy.”   
Kara’s mild weakness grew to utter helplessness. Her fingers feeling the size of anvils, her eyes losing focus. “I’m sorry puddin’,” said Harley as the world lost its shape. “But hey, we’ll always have the car ride!”  
Kara dropped, her face slamming to the cold hardwood floor. As consciousness bled from her mind, there were only two sounds she could make out. That of the tied-up man grunting in terror, and a man’s shrill laughter bouncing all through the otherwise silent home. 

#

“Take this left,” Renee said. The car bounced as they tore along residential streets, nearing three times the speed limit.   
“You want to tell me why we’re responding to a 911?” Allen asked over the scream of their siren.   
“We’re police aren’t we?”  
“We’re homicide. And if unless you missed that big ass bridge, we’re out of our jurisdiction.”  
Renee bit her nail so intently she didn’t notice it crack. She jerked her hand from her mouth. Blood grew at the tip of her finger. “I know them,” she said. “They’re friends. And they have kids.” Her partner needed nothing more, he drove as fast as the car would go.  
Three local police cruisers sat empty in front of the large colonial house Renee was so used to visiting. She jumped out as soon as they’d slowed down enough. She put her hand on her weapon and ran inside. Three officers stood in the living room, weapons drawn. She showed her badge and went inside.   
George, the man she’d known for years lay dead on the couch. His throat had been slashed open, his lips cut from his face exposing all of his teeth in a perpetual red smile.   
A young blonde woman lay on the couch beside him, she was half conscious and holding a knife. A message was written across the wall beside her but Renee didn’t stay long enough to read it. She ran upstairs, where children slept.  
The hallway was covered in darkness. Renee flipped the light switch but nothing happened. A crunch made her heart skip a beat, she had stepped on broken glass. The lightbulbs had all been smashed.  
She pulled her gun from its holster and turned on her flashlight. The door at the end of the hall was halfway open, light flashed on and off from inside, the smell of burnt plastic polluted the air. This was Lily’s room, George’s wife, and Renee’s first love, now her best friend.   
“Anything?” Allen asked as he climbed to the landing behind her.   
“Check the children’s room,’ she told him as she continued to move to the door ahead. She pushed it open.   
The room had been trashed. The lamp lay on its side, the bulb blinking erratically, a thin slither of smoke rising from inside as it burned the plastic cover. The mirror lay in silver shards on the rug. Renee’s eyes were drawn to the wall, another message, the letters dripping red with blood. “HE MADE ME DO IT!!” it read.   
She passed her flashlight over the floor as the lamp went out one last time. Feet stuck from beside the bed. Recently manicured. The woman wore old cotton pajamas, the kind no one outside family would ever see her in. She’d been stabbed more times than Renee could count. Her face had been cut... smiling like her husband’s...  
Renee backed from the scene, her mind hissing blank, she turned. Allen stood in the hall, his face ashen. “No...” she said. She ran, trying to get past him to the children’s room. He grabbed her by the waist and pushed.  
“Don’t,” he said. She lost her strength. Memories flooded her mind. Birthday parties, hugs, baby-sitting nights with pizza and movies. Renee did her best not to vomit but the smile on her friends’ faces, the thought of the same on the children... she ran to the toilet and tasted the tart acidic bile mixed with the bland chicken sandwich she’d had a few hours earlier.   
She washed her mouth in the sink and looked up. A message, scratched on the mirror. “HE MADE ME.”  
“Renee,” Allen called, his voice sweet, full of compassion. She didn’t listen to what he said next. She hurried downstairs, back to the living room where the officers still hadn’t arrested the young woman lying half sleep on the couch.   
“What’re you doing? Get cuffs on her,” she ordered.   
“Ma’am, look...” one of the officers pointed to the girl’s chest.  
Renee looked down. A symbol had been painted in blood on the girl’s shirt. An upside down triangle, inside it, a capital S. “It’s really her,” the officer behind her said. “It’s Supergirl.”  
Renee looked up to the bloody message written on the wall. The one she had ignored the first time through.   
“SUPERMAN MADE ME DO IT.”


	7. Guilty

“Bruce...” Superman said, lightly shaking Bruce who still lay on the street. “Where did she go? What happened?”  
“She’s looking for the Joker,” Bruce said with a grunt as he stood up.  
“Don’t worry, your cousin can take care of herself, believe me,” Nightwing said rubbing the bruise on his chin as he joined the others.   
Superman took note of Bruce’s smoking armor and ripped metal suit. “Did she do this to you?” he asked.   
“No, it was Harley Quinn,” Batman said. Superman looked around him, his eyes fading white as he looked though the building walls around them.   
“No sign of them,” he said.   
A police cruiser sped up to them. Two officers stepped out. “Superman, you’re back... are you here to help us catch the escapee?” one of the policemen asked.   
“She’s not dangerous,” Superman responded.  
“She killed an orderly,” the second cop said.   
“He attacked her,” Nightwing told them, the two officers traded looks. “We’ll find her,” Nightwing reassured them.  
“But if you spot her first, light the Batsignal,” Superman said. “Don’t try to take her in without me.”  
“I thought you said she wasn’t dangerous,” the first cop said.   
“Go,” Batman interrupted. The two cops got in their car and sped off. “We can’t trust the police here. We’ll find her Clark. She’ll be alright.”  
“Something doesn’t feel right,” Nightwing said.  
“That Harley Quinn just happened to be here with an RPG… I know” Batman said.   
“Kara wouldn’t kill an innocent,” Superman added. “Something’s going on.”  
“She told me his eyes glowed green, the orderly” Nightwing said. “Maybe what you said about magic wasn’t as stupid as it sounded.”  
“Wherever she is, she’s in trouble,” Superman said. “I’ll do a flyover of the city, see if I hear anything.”  
“If the police get her before we do--” Batman began. “Don’t make it worse. There are still those who fear us.”  
“Perception’s not a high priority right now,” Superman said as he slowly floated off the ground. “I’ll take care of my cousin first, we can deal with police politics later.”   
Superman shot into the sky. Batman looked to Nightwing. “Quinn being here wasn’t a coincidence, Joker’s been planning this.”  
“We have to find him or we’re just following his traps,” Nightwing said.  
“The RPG, it’s on the roof. Find where it came from.”  
“You’re following the green eyes bit?” Nightwing asked, Batman nodded then fired his grappling hook and was gone. 

#

Lois lay in the Jacuzzi, hoping to relax after Clark had left in the middle of the night in search of Kara. Sleep was futile until he returned safely with his cousin. She touched a hand to her stomach, it was still flat, but underneath, a life was beginning to grow. She felt guilty for smiling. So many things seemed to be going wrong, yet the thought of Clark being a father, the thought of him playing with a son or daughter of their own, it filled her with a hope she hadn’t realized she had lost. It made her think about the future, which, as it turned out, she hadn’t before.  
Clark was always going to be Superman and she was always going to be a journalist, only that wasn’t true. Clark Kent and Lois Lane would grow old, and when they did, she now knew, they wouldn’t be alone.   
She turned on the TV which hung over the tub, another perk to living in Bruce Wayne’s apartment. Lois jerked up when she saw the headline at the bottom of Cat Grant’s screen. “BREAKING NEWS: Supergirl arrested for murder.”  
“Where’s he been?” Cat Grant asked the camera. “And why have we never gotten a real explanation for this?” a picture the world was all too familiar with came up on the screen, it was that of Superman carrying Lois into the E.R, both covered in her blood. The last time the public saw either of them in person.  
“Superman, Supergirl and Lois Lane, all disappeared from the face of the earth for months, well sure, miss Lane sent a video to the Daily Planet saying she was fine, but can we trust it? Especially now when Supergirl has just been confirmed to be in the custody of the Gotham PD. There’s still no statement from the police but don’t worry we have our team out there and we will get to the truth. For those of you who feared Superman when he first arrived I say to you, maybe you were right to be afraid. We’ll cut in throughout the night as we get more information. I’m Cat Grant and this is The Line.”  
“Oh god...” Lois said to herself, the hope she had felt now turning sour, turning into dread. 

#

Kara woke only to shut her eyes tight against the intrusive white light of the florescent bulbs that hung above her. She was sitting on a cold metal bench. She tried to stand. A loud clunk rang through the room. She looked to her wrists, she was restrained. Bars cut the room instead of walls; a cell.  
She tried to call out but her voice was all but gone. The weakness she’d felt earlier was still with her. She looked about the room, then down to her leather restraints.   
“It’s coated in kryptonite,” said Renee. The cell-door buzzed and she entered the room, sitting across from Kara. “Courtesy of your Mayor. Luthor’s made some pretty amazing leaps with the stuff. Gas Kryptonite, liquid... there are rumors that he figured out how to make it so he has an unlimited amount... I’m not so sure. People usually blow that stuff out of proportion.”  
“Why does Gotham have it?” she asked, her voice just barely a whisper.  
“He gave it to most major cities last year, a secret donation. And yes, if you’re wondering, we have kryptonite laced bullets, she pointed to one of two magazines on her belt, it had been marked with a vertical neon-green line. “That’s not a threat, just, in the spirit of full disclosure, I thought you should know. I’m detective Montoya, homicide. Do you know where you are?”  
“There was a man... he was tied up, you have to get there before--”  
“Where do you think we picked you up?”  
“And Harley?” Kara asked.   
“Harley?”  
“I don’t know her last name... she shot Batman with a Bazooka.”  
“Quinzel… she was there?”  
“She’s the one who took me there. She said Joker would be there. Then she sprayed me with something.”  
“You’re saying you were framed?” Renee asked. Kara could see that the woman in front of her was holding something back. Though she acted as if nothing was wrong, her jaw was locked tight, her eyes puffed up as if she had been crying. Kara’s mind was still swimming, it took her a moment to realize what had just been said.  
“Framed? For what?” she asked. She looked to her hands and only now realized her fingers were dark with ink.  
“You knew the family,” Renee began. “You submitted your fingerprints for a background check when you worked at a daycare center in Metropolis a few years ago.”  
“You know my--”  
“Kara Danvers. Just a normal young woman, turns out to be one of the world’s finest heroes. I didn’t know what I was expecting, but that wasn’t it. I wonder who Superman is, a chef?” Kara says nothing, they remained quiet for a few moments. You kind of disappeared for a while there. What happened?”  
“I...” Kara began, trying to collect her thoughts, maybe telling her everything was the right thing to do.  
“You escaped from Arkham earlier... and killed someone to do it. If there is anything I need to know, tell me now or--”   
“Wait...” Kara said, Renee’s words from earlier only now occurring to her. “Who did I know? ...you said I knew the family, what family?”  
Renee held herself back but her rage was in full view, there was no hiding it now. “Lily Mills, George Mills. Penny. Michael.”  
“Penny...” Kara remembered the toddler she watched while working in the daycare a few years prior.   
“That’s where we found you. A knife in your hand, their blood on your blade, your clothes.”  
“Penny’s... dead?”  
Kara remembered the girl and her funny questions, the way she had no problem speaking to every other kid in the class and how Kara admired her for that. Then she saw the orderly’s eyes in his last few moments. Whatever had taken hold of him was gone by the time she killed him, the man who had always taken the extra effort to be nice to her. Even if she had been framed for this, she was guilty of murder.  
And suddenly, she couldn’t breathe. Her mother’s burning body, her friends left to rot, the thought of that little girl dead, the pit only got deeper. She had to leave. She felt as if she were suffocating and the kryptonite on her wrists, and the metal bars-- the cold looks, it was all wrapping around her throat. Sorrow turned to fury.   
“I can’t-- I can’t be here...” Kara pulled her arms up, trying to break the restraints. Renee hopped to her feet, her hand on her weapon.   
“Kara--”  
“Let me out!” Kara screamed-- her voice piercing through the building.   
The chatter that had filled the halls fell completely silent. In the quiet, footsteps echoed, Kara and Renee both turned to look.  
Superman walked up to the cell. “Kal,” Kara said, relief washing over her. The officers around him remained frozen, unsure what to do. “Take me home...” she begged.  
“She’s under arrest,” Renee told him.  
“There’s more going on than you know, she’s not safe here. Open this door,” he said, turning back to the officer at the security desk down the hall. Nothing happened. He wrapped a hand around the bars and pushed it open, the lock cracking with ease.   
“This isn’t the way,” Renee told him.  
“I’ll explain once I know who we can trust.”  
His eyes glowed red. Superman turned to Kara’s restraints and fired a red burst of heat from his eyes, cutting the leather. He took his cousin into his arms. Her heart was finally calming down, his embrace was the opposite of everything she had been feeling until this moment. The cold, the dark, it all melted away as someone she care for and who cared for her had come to take her from the pit she had been falling into.   
Renee pulled her gun. Superman blew it from her hand with another blast of heat from his eyes. She grabbed her hand as it burned. He turned to the other officers. They all raised their hands. He took Kara in his arms and walked her out.   
Renee grabbed the shoulder-radio of the closest officer. “All units, this is detective Montoya, we are now in pursuit of Superman.”


	8. Most Wanted

Police helicopters filled the night sky. The streets drowned in a river of red and blue. Sirens polluted the predawn silence. News choppers soon followed the GCPD’s example, scouring the skies for the man in blue.  
A spotlight fell on Superman as he hovered in place among the skyscrapers, his unconscious cousin in his arms, she hadn’t slept in almost twenty four hours, he did his best to let her rest as he tried to figure out which way to go. He knew he couldn’t go back to the penthouse in fear of being seen.  
“Superman,” the police helicopter called out “...land and return the suspect to police custody, this is an order. We have the means to bring you down...”   
Superman looked up to the light, his eyes awash in the white. He had done so much, given so much of himself to help people, thousands, always with a smile, and now, when he needed them, they had no capacity to understand what he was going through nor the desire to do so.   
He felt betrayed. He understood their fear, and therefore their hesitation to leave control to anyone but themselves, but this wasn’t about him, it was about a girl who had lost everything and everyone she had grown to love. A girl who watched her birth mother die only to experience the same with her adoptive one.   
No, the police didn’t know all of this, but they didn’t need to know, all they needed was his word, or so that’s what he believed. He could see cameras on him from above and below, the whole world, ready to judge, ready to call him a fugitive. He wanted to explain, but he wanted his cousin safe first. Wherever he was, the Joker was watching and Superman knew they weren’t safe out in the open, not even The Man of Steel felt secure when it came to the Clown Prince of Gotham.   
Bang! A bullet ripped toward him from the helicopter above. Superman dodged left as it cut across his arm. He looked down, blood oozed from the wound. A kryptonite bullet, inches from Kara’s head. His patience burned to nothing like a neutral match finally struck.   
Superman rose to the helicopter above like a devil of folklore, his eyes glowing blood red. The men inside trembled, the shooter dropped his gun in terror. Superman screamed as he subdued himself from the damage his anger begged of him. He burst from the sky with a deafening boom. 

#

Lois watched the street below in quiet awe. Where there was once traffic and horns in the early dawn hours, this day there was nothing. Cabbies had no one to swear at, their yellow cars moved with ease along mostly empty streets. Busses ran miles without pulling over at a stop. She turned back to the TV, assaulted once again by the image which had been running on repeat across all stations. Superman’s red eyes aimed at a police helicopter.  
“The shot was fired by accident by a new recruit,” said Cat grant, speaking to Camera. “The officer who fired the bullet has not yet made a public statement but our sources in the GCPD have confirmed that he did not mean to shoot Superman. Now, we move on to this, everyone has been asking who was the girl Superman was carrying during the incident. I have the answer and you’re not gonna believe it. Certain members of the Gotham PD, in conjunction with officers of the Bristol Township PD, have released a statement to CATCO, why me? Because in the past I’ve treated them and their stories with respect and sincerity, now it’s important to note, this is not an official police statement. This is a statement by some officers who feel it absolutely necessary for the public to know what’s going on, okay and here it is, and no they have not signed their names in fear of reprimand, but I know one personally and can assure this is authentic. And I quote, ‘Kara Danvers was arrested late last night on suspicion of murder, she has also been identified as the alien referred by the press as Supergirl, a supposed relative of Superman though there is no confirmation of that. Four bodies, including two below the age of thirteen were found brutally murdered in a residence in Bristol County where miss Danvers was found. The suspect had the murder weapon in her hand upon the primary officers’ arrival at the home, as well as the blood of all four victims on her clothes and person. Miss Danvers was acquainted with the victims. We have also confirmed that miss Danvers has spent the last few months in Arkham Asylum and escaped last night after killing a guard. Soon after she was arrested, Superman broke into the police station and took the suspect by force. Their whereabouts are as of yet unknown’.... This on top of everything else, the bloody picture, the silence from Lois Lane, my long time personal friend--”  
Lois gasped at the inaccuracy of that statement. “Bitch...” she whispered.  
“...We’ve entered a whole new ballgame now folks,” continued Cat. “Stay tuned as we’ll be bringing you more updates on this story as it develops. Unbelievable...”  
Lois clicked off the TV. She remained in the middle of the living room, still as a statue, the cold air creeping over her skin, making her shiver. For a moment she felt lost, the same feeling she had on her first day at the Daily Planet, as if she didn’t know her place, as if she had no place. Helpless.  
And then she remembered how she got past that feeling at the Planet, she acted. She moved forward, she interrupted meetings, she investigated cases others were too afraid to go near.   
Lois ran to her room and rummaged through the suitcases she had never bothered to unpack since they had no plans of going anywhere. At the bottom she found what she had been looking for, her jeans. She had enjoyed living without the need of ever wearing anything besides sweatpants and boxer briefs, the one secret Clark was never allowed to tell anyone, but she knew it was time. It wasn’t safe for her to leave but it wasn’t safe for Clark and yet he always went toward danger for others, and now it was her turn to do the same for him.   
She hesitated at the door as she remembered what had happened to Kara’s friends and family. She too became a target after the photo of her being carried by Superman became public. The world didn’t know what their relationship was, but they knew he was in tears when they arrived, and they knew he took her from the hospital without authority, to an unknown location. If the Joker was looking to do damage to Superman, Lois Lane was on the target list. She pulled open the door and marched out. 

#

“It’s okay,” Clark said. Kara recognized his voice but she couldn’t open her eyes against the harsh bright light of the morning sky. “Just a bit at a time,” he told her. Finally she was able to see, and what she saw was beautiful.  
She was lying on a hill, the sun had just risen over the horizon, bathing everything in a light she had almost forgotten existed. “Hey there,” he said, smiling down at her. She sat up and looked at him. His red cap and blue suit made her feel safe, like she was home, his gentle familiar voice was everything she needed and didn’t know she’d been missing. “Kal,” she said, her voice getting trapped in her throat. “I’m so sorry--”  
“No, no it’s, don’t apologize... it was an accident,” he said, kneeling down to her. “No one’s mad at you. Lois doesn’t blame you. We love you.”  
She nodded, her eyes filled with tears. Only now did she realize how much she needed someone to tell her the things he was telling her, the things she had convinced herself weren’t true anymore.   
Like a latent wave, she began to feel the sun. The lethargic feeling she had woken up with every day for the last few weeks was entirely gone, as if she had been tired but hadn’t been able to rest in so long that she forgot what it was to feel refreshed.   
“Where are we?” she asked, standing up and surveying the area. She could see a large house in the distance.  
“On top of the Batcave. This is all Bruce’s land.”  
“I’ve never seen it in the daylight.”  
“It’s quite something,” he said, but his tone was weak.  
“What’s wrong?” she asked. He crossed his arms.   
“I messed up... I took you from the police station... I lost my temper, the police came after me. It’s a mess.”  
Kara only now began to remember the events of the night before. The police, Harley, the blood, the orderly. The nightmare was real. “I killed someone...” she said, almost entirely to herself. He took her hand.  
“Dick said you were attacked. We don’t know what happened but we’ll work it out together. Don’t Put it all on yourself, you didn’t set out to kill anyone.”  
“But I wanted to, there was a second or two where I...” she looked up to him, the firm ground beneath her feeling as if it was about to give. “Clark... I’m so lost.”  
He took her in his arms, his breath shook like hers. He was afraid. “I am too, he said, then pulled back and looked into her eyes. “...But we’ll find our way. Together.”  
“Clark, Kara,” Bruce said as he reached the hill behind them. “Sorry to interrupt--”  
“What is it?” Clark asked.  
“Lois. She’s on TV.”


	9. Spotlight

The studio lights warmed back on, Lois grimaced against the brightness. A makeup woman stood behind her doing God knew what to her hair while Cat rambled about how great it was she had come and how grateful she was that she chose The Line to make her return. But Lois only came to CATCO because this was the most viewed news show in the country. And she took note that nowhere in her speech did Cat Grant ask if she was okay.  
“Ready?” Cat asked as the countdown from commercial began. Lois didn’t know if she was ready, she hadn’t prepared anything to say, she just knew she had to tell the world who Superman was before people like Cat Grant did it for her. Lois nodded and the countdown went on, 3, 2 1...  
“The first question I want to ask our guest is... are you alright?” Cat turned to Lois with her most sincere look. Lois almost laughed.   
“I’m fine. I’ve been fine, that’s why I’m here. I want people to know the truth.”  
“The truth?” Cat asked.   
“About Superman, about who he is.”  
“We know he’s an alien, we know he’s the most powerful being on the earth... what do you know?”  
“You’re right, he is the most powerful person anyone has ever know, and he’s only used that power for good, no one can deny that.”  
“Well, that was true, until recently.”  
“He had to get his-- Supergirl out of jail.”  
“So where have you been? You and Superman? Were you together?”  
“Yes... and Supergirl, we took her in, she lost people, we believe the Joker was behind everything that happened, that he was terrorizing her, we’re not sure why, but he took a lot from her, more than anyone deserves. We couldn’t let her be alone. And if her friends were targets then so were we. Well... not me especially, not until what happened.”  
“Can you tell us about it?”  
“Yes...” she looked at the camera. “I’m sorry if you’re watching Supergirl, but I have to tell them everything or they won’t understand.”  
“You can call her Kara,” Cat smiled.   
Lois was suddenly very glad that Clark had never made their relationship public. “One day...” Lois began, “after she had been living with us for a few weeks, I heard Kara crying in the bathroom. She didn’t know I was there, she was having an episode... the mirror was in pieces and she had a shard in her hand... she was trying to cut herself but it wouldn’t... the glass didn’t pierce her skin. She got frustrated and threw the glass. That’s how I got this,” Lois pulled her hair back and showered the scar on her neck. “It was an accident, but after that we put her in Arkham for treatment. She’s not a monster, she was just a girl whose world has fallen apart. She would never hurt someone on purpose.”  
“But she did. She went to Arkham for treatment but she didn’t stay there. She escaped, and she killed someone to do it.”  
“I don’t believe it, there’s gotta be some mistake, I know her,” Lois said, her conviction true.  
“Before you came here today we received a piece of video. My producer’s telling me it’s time to play it, be warned the footage we’re about to show is graphic in nature.”  
The studio went quiet. The monitor ahead, which had so far only reflected Cat and Lois cut to a black and white shot of a small room. There was no sound. Kara sat atop the orderly, her hands around his throat. He struggled against her until his arms and legs simply went limp. The monitor cut back to Cat and Lois.   
“So--” Cat began.  
“No, we didn’t see everything... the room was all torn up, something happened before that...”  
“We will look into that but Lois... she’s Supergirl, by your own admission, if Superman is one of the most powerful people on Earth, then so is she, and the world has seen what she can do. Why didn’t she stop?” Cat waited for Lois to come up with an answer but she had none. “And then she was arrested in a house full of bodies, knife in hand, and before the police could interrogate her, Superman broke through the walls and took her out of there.”  
“She can’t be in public...” Lois said in a voice just barely more than a whisper. “Joker--”  
“Lois, she’s been accused of several murders, one of which is on video. Who is Superman to bypass the law?”  
“He made a mistake.”  
“And this?” The photo of Superman facing the helicopter blinked into the monitor. “Was this a mistake?”  
“He had been shot! He didn’t kill anyone, he could’ve killed them all but he didn’t!”  
“All we know for sure right now is that there is someone out there who has tried to hurt herself and has in fact killed a man with her bare hands-- someone with powers we can’t fathom... and we’re scared. On top of that... this person has a guardian, a man with even greater power who won’t let her face justice, someone who will swoop down from the sky and take what he wants, save who he wants... I’m being honest right now Lois... I’m scared. We’re live on the air and I can’t tell my crew that they’re safe here, with you. I’m scared to speak in a country where speech was our first freedom. We all loved Superman, but now we find ourselves asking... what do we really know about him?”   
Lois was silent for a moment, the faces of the camera men ahead only now beginning to register... they were afraid. “Can I say something? If he’s watching maybe I can--”   
“Please,” Cat said, gesturing for her to face the camera in front of her.  
Lois looked ahead. “Superman... it’s okay... things got out of hand but, they just want to talk to you. We all want to hear from you. Your side of the story. Tell them everything and things will be okay. We believe in you. And I wouldn’t mind seeing you.” 

#

Clark stepped away from the monitor, thinking. Bruce moved beside him. “We can make a video, we can explain,” Bruce told him.   
“Kara’s still a suspect in those murders, we need proof first, then I’ll make a statement,” Clark said.   
“He was possessed...” Kara said behind them. “The orderly, I knew him, he was kind... when he attacked me, it was like he didn’t know why he was doing it. His eyes turned green, like what I saw at my mother’s.”  
Bruce turned back to the computer and began typing. “Was that helpful?” Kara asked.  
“We’ll see,” he responded. With a narrower search it should only take seconds--  
“Here,” Bruce said as the computer revealed five documents. Each paper had been almost entirely redacted, a few matching phrases were all they could see; green eyes, hallucinations, apparitions...   
“Where are these from?” Clark asked. Bruce pointed to the CIA stamp on the top right hand corner.  
“Don’t say we’re--”   
“Hacking the CIA? Yeah, we are,’ Bruce said as he began working.   
The program had been running for a few hours when Kara moved up behind Bruce. She stood silently watching the code grow and multiply. “What’s on your mind?” Bruce asked.   
“I’m sorry...” Kara said, “...about before.” Bruce turned back to her.   
“Believe it or not, that’s not the first time I’ve fought a Kryptonian,” he smiled.  
“I know, you came up with that mech-suit pretty fast.”  
“It’s not a mech-suit, it’s--”  
“Who won?” she asked. He made no answer for a while, then turned to her.   
“It was tie.”  
The computer beeped, the hack was finished. “Damn it...” Bruce said under his breath. Clark jogged up to them.   
“What’s wrong?”  
“All of the files related to the ones we found are also redacted...”   
“Isn’t that to be expected?” Clark asked.  
“The CIA redacts files they send out to the media and other agencies, why would they redact files from themselves?” Bruce asked. Clark and Kara traded looks, good point. Bruce scrolled through the hundreds of documents, all of which were covered in black bars save for their dates which only went back 18 months.   
“All these files are marked,” Kara said, pointing to a light gray header which stood over every file.  
“Task Force X,” Clark said, reading it aloud.   
“Oh wait, what’s that?” Kara asked, taking over the keyboard. A file came up, the text also black but the photo attached was clear. Bruce took nudged her over and began typing again. A scanner program took the photo and within seconds came back with a match. A new file popped up, this one from Blackgate Penitentiary.   
“Floyd Lawton,” Bruce said, reading the inmate file. The word DECEASED was stamped across it in red.   
“Lethal Injection, two years ago,” Clark said. “Another dead end.”   
“Stick to journalism Clark,” Bruce told him as he got his coat and put it on.  
“Where you going?”  
“Getting answers.”  
“We don’t even have the right questions yet,” Clark said, exasperated.   
“Why was some inmates photo in a CIA file from the last few months if he died two years ago? And what does it have to do with green eyes and apparitions?” he asked. Clark had no answer. “Wait here, you two shouldn’t be seen right now, and you’d only slow me down,” Bruce said as he opened a small vault in the wall. Inside were masks nearly indistinguishable from actual human faces. He took one out and put it on.   
“You’re wearing that?” Kara asked. “Wouldn’t Batman be more appropriate for something like this?”   
“No for this,” Bruce said. He put on a hat and picked up a cane, then he was gone.


	10. Task Force X

Bruce could tell just from looking at the correctional officers exiting Blackgate, which were the ones working in gen-pop and which worked on death-row. Men who had been in confrontations all day came out with their shoulders up, confident from the power they wield in the prison. But the men he was searching for walked with a slouch, their eyes kept to the ground, their arms hung low. This was the toll of death on the living.   
Of course he had already read all their files and seen their pictures but from this much of a distance, he had mostly his instinct to go on. Only one of the death-row guards worked here when Lawton was supposed to have been executed. Bruce watched the one with the slowest gait as he bypassed his car, B-lining straight for the pub across the street. Bruce fixed his hat and walked with limp, making his way to the bar.

#

“He’s afraid,” Bruce spoke into the payphone on the street. “He didn’t tell me much, but he thinks he’s being watched,” he told Clark. A knocking sounded on the glass beside him caught his attention, he looked up. Lawton stood with a pistol trained at Bruce’s head.   
“And he’d be right,” Lawton said. “Hang up.” Bruce did as he was told, and knowing Clark’s inability to work the batcomputer, with which he could easily trace the call, Bruce figured he was on his own until Kara worked it out.  
“Now you gotta tell me the story ‘cause I’m just too damn curious... why’s some old man I’ve never met asking questions about me?” Lawton asked.  
“You have nothing better to do than follow people from your past? If you’re so afraid of being found, why not disappear?”  
“I never said I was the only one following him.” Bruce surveyed the area. Men in dark suits had already surrounded him. There was a time where this kind of thing would never have happened to him. Maybe Lawton wasn’t referring to the mask when he called him an old man.   
“You’re not the only I’m looking for,” Bruce said, leaning harder on his cane. He made himself look as frail as possible. The men around him drew closer. Against an elderly man with a limp, they grew confident, dominant. He could see two, a third he could hear, including Lawton, that made four. He could deal with four.   
“I don’t care,” Lawton said, raising his gun.   
“You would kill an unarmed old man?” Bruce asked.  
“I’m supposed to be dead. My kid’s depending on me to keep the world believing it. Sorry, between her and you, I choose her.”  
Bruce launched the cane straight ahead-- it bounced off Lawton’s nose with a loud crack, sending him stumbling backward. He snatched the gun from Lawton’s hand. Before the other men could reach for their weapons, Bruce fired three shots, each man taking a bullet to the shoulder.  
A kick from behind rocked his ribs and sent him falling to the ground, he rolled and spun around, aiming the gun back at Lawton who now had a second pistol aimed at Bruce.   
“I told you, I’m not here for you,” Bruce said.  
“What then?”  
“You worked for something called Task Force X...”   
“We had a different name for it,” Lawton said.  
Bruce could hear the men behind him moaning in pain and anger. They would be reaching for their weapons in seconds. Bruce knew Lawton wouldn’t let him escape and he knew he couldn’t stay where he was. Changing locations was his only option for success. Bruce jerked the gun right and fired two shots into a parked car’s gas tank.   
Lawton recoiled against the sudden fireball. Bruce ran into the alley ahead. He knew there was a fire-escape that would lead him to the roof where he would have the advantage. He Looked up. The fire-escape was gone, collapsed and never rebuilt. A gun cocked behind him. Bruce turned. Lawton fired.  
Bruce’s eyes closed in fear and reflex. For a moment there was only silence. He peeked. Superman stood between him and Lawton. The man of steel darted to Lawton and put a firm hand on his shoulder, pushing him down to his knees. Superman took the gun from his hand and smashed it against the wall.  
“Ow! Okay, I submit! Christ!” Lawton shouted.   
“I knocked out his friends,” Kara said as she walked into view. She stayed back, watching it all from afar, Bruce could tell she wasn’t in the mood for violence.   
“All right,” Superman began. “...ask what you need to ask,”   
“Thanks,” Bruce said as he approached his friend, then turned his attention to Lawton. “We’re looking for someone who was on your team. They had... strange abilities. They could make people see things that weren’t there... make people do things. I need to know who.” Lawton’s eyes widen with the memory of it.   
“Her? She’s the one you’re after? Why didn’t you say so, she freaks me out, I have no love for witches.”  
“She’s a Witch?” Superman asked, surprised.  
“What would you call someone who can do that shit? I don’t know her, she was never with the team, she was always off somewhere, making things happen from afar. I only know what the others called her... Enchantress.”  
“He’s telling the truth,” Superman said.  
“Who was in charge?”  
“I’ll tell you if you let me go. I have a kid. And those guys back there aren’t exactly my bodyguards. They watch me. I don’t kill unless I think my kid’s gonna pay for it.” Superman nodded, truth.  
“No more killing,” Bruce said. “He can tell if you lie...” he gestured to Superman who smiled.   
Lawton nodded. “No more killing.”

#

“Amanda Waller,” Clark said as Kara pulled a file up on screen. “Not much on her, military for a few years then, not much after that. Guess that sounds about right for someone who can redact their own reports.”   
“What would the Joker have to do with someone from the Government?” Kara asked.   
“Probably nothing,” Bruce said, pulling the chair she was sitting on. She stood, he took her place. “But if Waller uses people like Lawton, who was on Death-row for murder, then she probably uses people who run in the same circles as the Joker, they may have a mutual conn--”   
A sharp whine of audio feedback pierced from the monitor speakers.   
“What is it?” Clark asked. Bruce checked the computer, looking to see where the transmission came from.   
“Nightwing’s comms. He’s been tracking the RPG Harley used.” He bent down to the console. “Nightwing, did you find anything?”  
A burst of laughter shattered from the speakers, one all too familiar to Bruce. “Oh yeah,” the Joker’s voice cut in. “He found something...”  
A message blinked on the monitor. “Open Me,” it read.   
“Wait,” Clark said, “...it could be a virus.”  
Bruce double clicked on it. A video popped up, the word “Live,” blinking on the top right-hand corner. It showed Nightwing tied to a chair and gagged. He had already been beaten. Blood ran from the gashes on his face, staining his black and blue suit. Both of his eyes were swollen.   
“What do you want?” Bruce asked through gritted teeth.   
“Only what I‘ve always wanted...” Joker’s voice echoed. “To see you smile...”  
Bruce started running a program to track the message. A distorted guitar riff pumped into the room. Harley Quinn entered the scene from the right, a baseball bat in hand. “He’s already black and blue...” she said with a pout. Then shrugged and swung the bat hard at his chest.   
“My God...” Kara said, her hand to her mouth.   
“Joker!” Bruce screamed. Joker stepped into frame, looking directly at camera. His eyes were bloodshot, his lips smeared red with makeup, his face white and peeling.   
“It’s the connections... they keep you down, you gotta cut ‘em out! Look at me! Look how free!” he said and began to dance to the music while Harley continued to swing her bat on Nightwing just behind him. Dick screamed through his gag, each blow landed with a sharp thud.  
The program beeped. An address came up on the screen. Bruce turned to Clark who nodded and in a second was gone like a shot.   
“I should go too...” Kara said.  
“No,” Bruce turned to her. “You’re not ready.” She wanted to argue but she knew he was right. She was not in control of herself yet.

#

Superman ripped through the skies, he was only seconds away. A helicopter swung ahead of him without noticing. He stopped, just short of hitting it. CATCO was written only the side of it. Inside a man scrambled to find his camera. He pick it up and focused on Superman. Behind them, a police helicopter swung down, two officers opened the sliding door, they were both armed though they kept their guns aimed down and their hands out toward him.   
“Do you want to make a statement?” the cameraman yelled over the propellers.   
Bruce’s voice broke through the comm in Superman’s ear. “They’re going to kill him!” Superman bypassed the helicopters, flying like a missile through the side of the warehouse where the video was coming from. He rose among the dust, ready to strike.   
The warehouse was quiet. Dark except for one spot where a light hung down, falling over Nightwing who remained in the chair. Superman walked towards it. He looked around the room and listened, no one else was here.  
“Superman?” Bruce’s voice called, “...do you see them?” Clark could smell the blood in the air, like pennies in his mouth.   
“Bruce he’s...”  
“No, the video’s still on! Are you in the right place?” Clark moved up to the body. A red make-up smile had been painted on his lips.   
At the Batcave, Bruce and Kara watched as the video continued to play. “Oh, I forgot to tell you, it’s a rerun tonight...” Joker said over the speaker, but in the video his mouth didn’t move. Bruce realized the audio was coming from the Nightwing’s comm, not the video. On the screen, Joker pulled a revolver from his belt, its barrel long and heavy, Joker struggled to aim it at Dick’s head. “Cut the connections. And then you’ll be free!” the Joker laughed and pulled the trigger.


	11. Requiems

A pale fog hung low on the grounds of Wayne Manor, like a veil carpeting the earth. Bruce and Clark carried the coffin on their shoulders, bringing it to rest at the open grave where Kara stood in silence beneath an arching willow tree which seemed to rain down from above. Lois had just arrived. She had been questioned by police after her appearance on The Line but was released when she wasn’t charged with a crime. She had heard too late of what happened and came wearing what she had on, Now, she joined Kara at the fourth grave in the small cemetery Bruce had constructed on the grounds. Martha Wayne, Thomas Wayne and Alfred Pennyworth all lay beside it.  
The two men lay the coffin atop the grave so it could be lowered. Bruce stood back, admiring the chestnut casket. He hoped Dick would have liked it. His mind was full of useless thoughts just then, like the change in the weather, he noted how the chill of autumn had been giving way to winter’s bite. And he heard Joker’s voice echoing in the halls of his mind... “It’s the connections... they keep you down...”   
He wondered about the millions of people just a few miles away in Gotham who had no ties to what was happening here, the people who lived in oblivion of the horrors he had lived through. The injuries of friends, the deaths. Not always as Batman but invariably as Bruce Wayne. He had lost so much, nearly all there was to lose. What was it like to be one of them on a day like this? What was it like to not be feeling the hollow thing in your chest, the helpless regret of not having been there. What was it like not to feel like you had just lost a son? Would he be happier if there were no Bruce Wayne? If there was only Batman?  
“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you...” Clark began, “I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid,” he finished and knelt to the lowering-device, slowly turning it, the casket fading into the white fog.   
Bruce closed his eyes, letting the sorrow he had been trying to keep at bay flow through him, filling every part. He welcomed it. He needed the sorrow to do what it needed before he could move on to what was next. First grief, then justice.

#

Renee ran her eyes over the board of photos, the Mills laughed and posed. Some were candid while others deliberate. Renee couldn’t help but gravitate toward the photos of Lily, especially the younger ones from when they had met. Too much eye liner, short, rebellious haircuts. Behind her she could hear people whispering their condolences to Lily’s parents. It was typical to find laughter and shared stories during a wake, but not here. Not this wake. An entire family say in closed caskets in the next room, and the sting of it was just too painful to ignore.  
Renee didn’t want to believe what the others told her was the only truth. She couldn’t understand how Supergirl could have done this, after all, the crime scene matched close to the Joker’s M.O and Kara had mentioned Harlene Quinzel, who now went as Harley Quinn and was known to have helped the Joker facilitate his escape from Arkham a few years prior.  
Yet, when Superman was given the chance to speak to the news, when he was face to face with their cameras, he remained silent. And Quinzel, had been a young doctor before she met the joker. It was possible that Kara had come into contact with the Joker and that was why she had been missing for months before being brought to Arkham. Could he have done to her what he did to the doctor? Had Supergirl fallen to madness? There was no question she killed the orderly, perhaps Renee’s hesitation to follow what the evidence pointed to came from the nostalgia attached to the memory of first seeing Supergirl flying around Metropolis, saving lives, helping the helpless. Finally, she had thought, a woman is the rescuer. The police force wasn’t the easiest place for a women and seeing another female running into danger rather than away from it, a young girl swearing to protect her people, it made Renee proud to be a woman.  
Renee had questioned Lois Lane after her television interview but had no grounds to hold her, Lois was not an accomplice to either crime committed the night of the escape, and had no proof that she had been with Superman for the past few months as she claimed.   
Perhaps she only wanted Kara to be innocent, but as she had discovered, Supergirl was only a regular person, a girl with a name and past jobs, the same jobs Renee had when she was younger. And she knew from years on the force that anyone was only one bad day away from becoming the Joker. 

#

Clark took Lois’ hand in his, they watched in silence as Bruce enclosed Nightwing’s armored suit in a tall glass case. Beside it stood the Robin and Batgirl suit, once worn by the commissioner's daughter, Barbara Gordon. Clark watched his friend. Bruce blamed himself, if he had not allowed the others to join him none of it would have happened. Dick would be alive, Barbara wouldn’t be condemned to a wheelchair.  
But in both cases they gave him little choice. Clark remembered when Dick joined Bruce as Robin, Batman’s partner. Bruce had been hesitant but Dick put himself in danger every chance he got, warnings would be little to dissuade him from going out and trying to prove himself. So Bruce taught the boy how to handle himself and eventually the two became a partnership which criminals feared and police admired.  
Clark couldn’t imagine his friends pain at the loss. And to see Bruce soldier on, asking about what to do next, it gave him great pride.   
“I need to talk to you,” Lois whispered. Clark nodded and told Bruce he would be back in a minute, he knew that when they reconvened it would be to make a plan on how they would follow their only lead, and how they could snatch a member of the CIA without bringing the wrath of the United States upon their heads.   
“Guys,” Kara said from across the cave as she turned up the volume on one of the monitors. The red banner at the bottom of her screen told them all they needed to know: Martial Law Declared in Gotham & Metropolis.   
“The President has not declared Superman an enemy of the state,” the news anchor began, “...but in a statement released by the White House this morning, he said that the people of need to feel safe, and until we can speak with Superman and Supergirl and know more, we will do what we need to protect our own.” As she spoke, shots of infantrymen and tanks rolling into both Gotham and Metropolis took over the screen.   
“Look at what they think of us...” Clark said, staring.   
“They’re afraid. Don’t lose faith,” Lois whispered  
back.  
“Maybe this is all I ever was to them... an alien. An alien who doesn’t belong.”  
“You’re more than that to those you saved, to their families... let them do what they need to feel safe. You’ll show them what a hero is. You’ll show them that you don’t blame them for what they do when they’re scared. I know it hurts... hey, look at me...”  
Clark let his eyes fall from the screen, his heart still beat heavy in his chest with the indignation that comes with being judged. But in Lois there was no anger, only love and understanding. A look was enough to calm him. A kiss enough to make him smile. “I want the father of my child to have faith in people,” she began. “I want him to be heroic in everything he does, and that means letting people make mistakes and not condemning them for it.”  
He nodded, finding the good in him once again, the boy from Kansas who was taught to put others ahead, who was taught that to serve was to be blessed. And he felt blessed, even among the horror and sorrow, he still had her, and she made things easier to take, he could never really put words to it but now he finally realized, he never felt like an outsider when he was with Lois. He wasn’t an alien to her, he couldn’t be, she was his home.  
“Do you understand what I’m saying?” she asked. He nodded again. She rolled her eyes and pulled him down. She whispered in his ear, “You’re gonna be a father.”  
He pulled back, unsure if what was happening was really happening. “You’re...” he began, she smiled wide and beautiful. He scooped her in his arms and did his best not to squeeze too hard.   
“Everything okay?” Kara asked from afar. Bruce also watched, curious.   
“You’re gonna be an aunt... or you know, the cousin equivalent,” he said.   
The sorrowful air around her eyes broke as she realized what the news meant. Clark even noticed her beginning to tear up. She ran across the cave and hugged Lois. Bruce gave Clark and firm handshake and for a few moments, it was as if they were regular people celebrating the good news that comes with being a family. But soon the kisses and hugs had all been given and it was time again to focus on the task at hand so that when the baby was born, this would all be a distant memory and now an everyday reality.  
“Everyone get some rest,” Bruce said, “...tonight we plan, tomorrow, we take Waller.”


	12. The House of El

Kara had wished the news of the baby would help to alleviate the rage that had been building inside her, but it only made it worse. She thought of her own life, she thought of the baby she would never have with James Olsen, and how all they got was a single kiss.  
“You should shower,” Lois told her. Kara had been staring out the penthouse window to the city below, her hands closed into fists. It took her another moment to realize something had been said.   
“Oh, yeah, I will... do you know where--” she began but Lois already knew what she was going to ask.   
“I’ve been keeping it clean for you.” Lois walked ahead, Kara following to the walk-in bedroom closet where Lois pulled or pushed something Kara couldn’t see. The back wall slid to the side, revealing her Supergirl suit. Kara’s own reaction surprised her. It seemed so much brighter than she remembered. It seemed foreign. She moved quietly to it and lay a hand on the symbol at the center, the symbol of her house. She remembered her mother wearing that same coat of arms when she went to work everyday.   
“It doesn’t feel like it’s mine anymore. I don’t know that I can wear it, after what I did...” Kara said, surprised at how easy it felt to speak the truth to Lois. She so badly wanted to be a part of a family that she had already begun to treat Lois as a sister.   
“Kara,” Lois said, turning the girl’s face towards her. Kara’s eyes were already swelling with tears. “Listen to me. You are the last daughter of the Red Sun of Krypton, this symbol, this suit, it’s who you are. The things that have happened to you, the mistakes you made aren’t your identity, they’re a part of you but they’re not you. This is you Kara,” Lois told her, touching the shoulder of the suit. “You are Supergirl. The only Supergirl.”   
Kara hugged her without warning. Lois wrapped her arms around the girl. Maybe, Kara thought, maybe she would be okay after all.  
“Oh...” Clark said as she walked in and saw them. Kara pulled back and wiped her face. “Everything alright?” he asked. Kara nodded.   
“Is it time?” she asked.  
“It is.”  
Lois took Clark’s hand. “Let’s give her some privacy,” she said, leading him out of the room. Kara turned back to the suit. Her suit. She smiled.  
Kara and Clark flew side by side over the city, Bruce’s Batwing just below them. Bruce had explained how they found Waller’s apartment but Kara hadn’t been listening, she wasn’t interested in the how, only the where. She watched the city below, each light a life, all them of afraid of her and her cousin. She was eager to find Amanda Waller and root out the plot which had made her an enemy of the people she cared for most. She had to remind herself to stay focused or she ran the risk of letting all her frustrations out on the first person who upset her, and with her that could be deadly.   
“Here,” Clark said, losing altitude. She followed his lead.  
When the door opened and Amanda Waller threw her keys on the table in the hall, they were already there, waiting for her. Batman had turned the alarm off before they even arrived on the premises, now they crowded the dark living room in silence. Waller flipped on the lights and looked up, surprise barely registering. Kara could hear her heartbeat, it remained steady.  
“You’re not scared...” Kara said, surprised.  
“Should I be?  
“No,” Superman told her. “We just need information. If you cooperate this will--”  
“Save it,” she said. “You’re not the first people to break into my home and you won’t be the last, skip to the chase, I don’t have time for exposition, I work for a living.”  
“You’ll just... tell us?” Kara asked, even more surprised.  
“Depends. What do you want know?”  
“Enchantress,” Batman said. “She worked for you. Task Force X. We need to find her.”  
“I can’t confirm such a program exists or ever existed, but you already know it did so I’ll just say, she’s no longer a part of it,” Waller said.   
“Why?” Kara asked.  
“In simple terms? She’s pure evil. She killed people without cause and that made classified missions much harder to keep quiet.” Waller moved to a painting on the wall and took it down, behind it was a safe. As she began putting in the combination, Batman looked to Superman who shook his head no, as if to say there were no weapons in the safe. Waller pulled out a file and handed it to Superman. “That’s where she’s been hiding out for the past few years. It’s a small island about a few hundred miles from the Gotham coast.”  
“Quarantine Island,” Kara said as she read it, remembering something from her history class.  
“That’s what they used to call it during the Typhoid outbreak of the twenties. Now it’s June’s home.”  
“June?”  
“Enchantress isn’t a person, she’s an entity and she lives inside June Moone, a quiet and lovely artist who’s never done harm to anyone. Please, if you go there, don’t hurt her.”  
“That’s all we came for,” Superman said, moving toward the open window.  
“Thank you,” Kara said. And she finally heard Waller’s heart skip a beat.

#

The brick building ahead stood monstrous on the shore of the small island. It reminded Kara of Arkham. As they landed and moved to the broken entrance doors, she felt that the soil beneath her had the same heavy feel as the soil surrounding the grounds of Arkham Asylum, the same feeling came over her as they walked on, as if gravity pulled harder here.   
She didn’t know the suffering that took place here all those years ago, but if it was anything like Arkham, it was something the walls wouldn’t soon forget. Since her stay there, she had thought herself far too easily fooled by dark rooms and quiet halls, easily able to believe the noises were sinister, the shadows malevolent. But she had the comfort of not knowing for sure if anything truly did live just outside her plane of vision. But Enchantress was the answer to the question of are there things in the shadows, and the answer was yes.   
Bruce’s eyes glowed a pale blue as he used his suit’s x-ray vision to search the building “You see anything?” he asked the others.  
“There’s something upstairs. Can’t make out what,” Superman said looking down the long hallway ahead. Kara found what he meant and focused her vision. Through the wall she saw only a skeleton hanging by the wrists.   
“It’s her,” she said, moving ahead.   
They made their way to the second floor. She opened the doors. The woman was bound to the wall, her arms over her head, her hair hanging down in frizzy ropes, covering her face. She was pale, weak, as if she had been here for days. She looked up to them, her eyes glowing green. She smiled.   
“Hello again,” she said, looking at Kara. Fear was replaced with rage. She saw her mother getting into the car, the fire, her body burning... Supergirl darted across the room, taking the woman by the neck and pushing her hard against the tiled wall.   
Superman shot across the room, pushing Kara back, she fell to the floor. “She killed my mother! She made me kill someone!” Kara shouted.   
“It’s not just her,” Superman reminded her.   
“That’s right... June’s in here too,” said Enchantress. “You wouldn’t want to be responsible for another innocent life now... or would you?”  
“You made me kill him,” Kara hissed.   
“Oh no... he was alive when I left him. And you know it.”  
Batman reached down for Kara, she yanked her arm back and stood on her own. Batman turned to the woman on the wall. “Who did this to you?” he asked. “Was it Joker?”  
Superman stepped ahead of Batman and looked her in the eye. “Why are you working with him? What do you want?”  
“I want many things, none of which have to do with the Joker.”  
“Then who?”  
“Lex Luthor,” she laughed.  
“What?” Superman’s calm exterior was beginning to break.   
“No,” Kara said joining them again. “What you did to me was personal, I saw your eyes. You weren’t just doing a job. You wanted to make me suffer.”   
“I didn’t say I worked for him, I work with him.”  
“Not anymore,” Kara said, moving to the door. The others had Enchantress, there was nothing she could or even wanted to do here anymore. If Luthor was truly behind the attacks at her mother’s and Arkham, she had nothing more to wait for. Before she was able to cross the door, Superman stepped in her way. “You can’t go,” he said.  
“He did this to me. To us, I have to bring him in.”  
“She’ll kill him,” Enchantress sang.   
“I’ll go,” Superman told her. Kara knew he was right. She wanted nothing more than to hurt whoever was responsible. She stood down, Superman left.   
“Why?” Kara asked Enchantress. Her voice almost breaking. “Why did you do this to me? My friends... my family... you took everything.”  
“Balance,” she began. “You all come from the sky, reaching down like gods, saving people who were marked for death. There’s a natural balance to the world and you upset that balance every time you save someone who was meant to die. Death must have what it's owed.”  
“Kara,” Batman said, surveying the woman ahead. “She never answered the question.”  
“What question?” Supergirl asked.   
“Who put her here, why is she restrained?”  
Enchantress laughed. “You’re all so upset, letting your emotions get the better of you, you didn’t even notice.”   
“You said you worked with Luthor,” Kara said. “He must have done it, trying to get rid of loose ends.”  
“Only someone who knows me very well would know to use iron chains...” she said. Kara looked at her restraints. They were old, black iron.  
“Waller?” she asked.  
“It was easy wasn’t it,” Enchantress said, turning to Bruce. “...finding me? I’m sure she made you work for it, but a little hacking here, a little there... and boom, you got your clues... and it led you right here, to me. I let Amanda use me to destroy you, I was happy to do it, what I didn’t know was she was going to use me, as bait for you.”   
“You said it was Luthor,” Kara said.  
“And who do you think introduced us?”  
“Bait...” Batman said. Kara looked at him, she could hear a faint rumbling growing louder and louder through the walls. Behind it, a whirring, something electrical in the room... a camera sat in the corner, looking down at them.  
“She set us up... Run,” Kara warned.  
The walls exploded as bullet came tearing through the room. Blood splattered across the air. A bullet tore into Kara’s shoulder-- Bruce tackled her to the ground when he realized what they were shooting with. She screamed in agony as she fell. He looked down. The bullet in her shoulder had shattered, green liquid oozed out making her nerves turn black. More bullets smashed into the walls, each sending more liquid Kryptonite flying in all directions. The body of June Moone hung bloody on the wall, torn to shreds by the barrage of gunfire. Batman pulled an explosive-gel gun from his belt and sprayed the floor. He covered himself and Kara and detonated.  
The floor shook and gave with a boom, they collapsed to the first floor. Kara screamed as she hit the floor, the pain running down her arm like fire.   
Bruce pulled tweezers from his belt and put his knee on her arm to keep her still. He reached into her shoulder and pulled out the bullet fragments but the liquid Kryptonite had done its job. Her veins throbbed, her arm lost its color. She could still move it but only slightly.   
“How...” she tried to ask of the bullet but the pain was too much.  
“It’s a Kryptonite tip with liquid Kryptonite inside but the liquid is local, it isn’t as potent as the solid, the rest of you is fine, it only affects what it touches--”  
“How do you know that?”  
“Because I’ve made something similar. In case I needed it...” he said.  
she looked away, realizing now that the fear the people of her city felt about her was beyond what she had imagined. “Clark doesn’t know they have this tech. Luthor’s the only one who can make something like this. He must have given it to Waller... you have to go, warn him before it’s too late.”  
“And you?” she asked.  
“I’ll make it out. I got the Batwing. Go.”  
She struggled to stand, her arm still burning beneath her. Kara closed her fists, the gravity around her shifting, building in force, she flew-- bursting through the walls and upper floors-- through the ceiling. The three helicopters spotted her but she was too fast for them.   
Behind her she could see the batwing taking off and flying the opposite way. He was safe. Now it was up to her to save her cousin. She focused all her energy on flying as fast as possible. The island was a dot behind her, the ocean spread vast and wide below.   
As the sun began to rise, something glinted silver in the sky, a tiny pinpoint a thousand feet ahead. A drone. It had already fired its missile. She looked up.   
All the air pushed from her lungs as the impact crushed down on top of her. Green fire burned across her body. Debris cut into her. That same familiar nausea churned her stomach, the nausea she felt around Kryptonite. She lost her focus. All was now only flashes of blue sky above and ocean below. Her eyes rolled back. For the second time in her life, Kara Zor-El fell from the sky in a hail of fire.


	13. Doomsday

Clark flew like a silent meteor over the sea. His heart burned with anger at what Luthor had done. A powerful man, hidden in shadow, using others to do his will. Clark wanted nothing more than to confront the man responsible for his cousin’s pain. Yet, he knew Bruce had been right when he told him he was a weapon. The world was watching and what he decided to show them would either reveal a hero or a monster.  
Clark had no desire to hurt anyone, but he feared what would happen in that room, when he was alone with the man who had for so long tried to take all that Clark had built. Though Luthor had never acted against him in a physical way, he had for years been speaking out against Superman in television interviews and anywhere else he could find the opportunity.  
Clark feared he wouldn’t be able to control the anger that had always been with him, the anger that only disappeared when he was around Lois and his friends. Now that he was going to be a father, he realized the source of it. It came from the fact that he had never been given a chance to know his own father and mother, the ones who gave their lives for his. He saved so many, countless lives would grow from his good deeds and yet his parents would never be saved, they were gone and he was left behind to be a hero to a world where he never belonged. Even as he was admired by millions, he was never one of them.  
But now he would choose to be a hero to his son, he would be what his father couldn’t. He would be present. Clark let the anger dissipate. He stopped thinking of the tragedies of the past, the ill that had befallen him and Kara and thought ahead, to beach days and park walks with the family he was building for himself. The shore came into view over the horizon. It was time to end the chapter of animosity between Lex Luthor and Superman.  
As Clark approached the Mayor’s mansion, he hovered in the air and looked down, using his X-ray vision to make sure it was safe. He feared very little when it came to his own safety, but Luthor was smart and cunning and was known to have more Kryptonite than anyone else in the world. As he continued to search the house from above, snow began to fall.  
Clark could see that the guards were stationed outside and the home was empty save for three. In the master bedroom, two people lay in bed, one asleep, the other sitting up, and another person stood beside the bed, doing something he couldn’t distinguish from here. Clark could see no weapons. The bed-frame was made from led, something he wasn’t surprised to find in the home of Lex Luthor. Once he had discovered that Superman couldn’t see through led, Luthor added it to everything he owned, eventually making it a vital part of his fashion choices, he was even known by the media as the Lead Mayor, not only for the actual use of lead but because the reasons for his policies were anything but transparent.  
Clark eased down to the balcony and looked inside. Luthor sat awake in bed, a small thin tube running from a machine beside the bed to his arm. He looked pale, weak. A nurse stood beside him and a woman, mostly covered by blankets and pillows lay on the bed beside him.  
Luthor’s eyes were on the television across the room. Superman entered. The nurse froze. “Go on,” Luthor told her. “Don’t call anyone, this is between us,” he said, she moved to the door and walked out. Luthor stood with some struggle.  
“You’re sick?” Superman asked.  
“A lifetime of working with Kryptonite... I have a year. Maybe less.”  
Superman pointed to the sleeping woman on the bed. Luthor waved it off. “Sleeping pills, she’s out. So. You’ve come. Finally.”  
“Why?” Superman asked. He couldn’t help himself. For as long as they had been enemies, he never really knew what drove Luthor. He wished he didn’t care but so much pain had been caused by someone he barely knew, he couldn’t let it go. “I want to know why you have such hate for me.”  
Luthor smiled and moved to a rocking chair near the door. Superman crossed the room toward him. “My father had an empire. I inherited after he died. I thought being the CEO of something like that would fix it. I was wrong.”  
“Fix what?”  
“The emptiness. For as long as I can remember, I’ve been at the bottom of someone’s boot. My father, bullies at school, women who only wanted to be with me for my wealth. It wasn’t until I saw you that I figure out what it was... power. Even with all my money, I was never in control, not even when I got the company... the board owned me. Every decision went through them. So. I sold it. I decided I was going to get my power the same way every other rich guy does. I was going to buy it. I was going into politics. And I was right. I was powerful as a mayor. But a lifetime of being stepped on takes a lifetime to heal and so I set my sights to the White House. Meanwhile, there you were, flying around, helping people, smiling down on us... I knew that one single look, one breath from you could end us, and yet people loved you.”  
“I would never hurt innocent people.”  
“No... maybe not. But if you can smile, it means you can frown, if you can be happy it means you can be angry. Scared. Frustrated... all I’ve ever done was to give our military and police force a way to deal with you if it ever became necessary, is that so wrong? Maybe I was a bit zealous in my speeches but at the end of the day, you’re the one with all the power... and we... what are we to you?”  
“Why did you do it to Supergirl? She lost everything.”  
He coughed, his body pulsing. He showed Superman the blood on his hands. “I began to get sick. And no amount of money was going to save me. All because I wanted to not feel completely powerless. And so my dreams of being president vanished. And my health went with it. And all the while, there you were, flying, soaring... no... I couldn’t take it, I admit, my motives are somewhat selfish but, I’m dying and, well, it just doesn’t matter anymore does it? I can tell you the truth. I do hate you. I hate you because I want to be you and I can’t. And so, when a man with a strange smile approached me and said, ‘I can help you kill Superman if you help me destroy the bat...’ I said yes. I made a deal with the devil because God wasn’t listening.”  
“You’re working with the Joker?”  
“I don’t understand him, and I don’t care to. I can’t say I approve of all his motives either but, what can I say, he gets things done,” Luthor said, his eyes moving from Superman to something just behind him.  
A pain like fire dug through Clark’s back. He tumbled to the floor as the bang of the shot filled the room. He turned his head. The woman in bed was sitting up. A gun in her hand. She reached up and pulled at her hair. Her wig. The Joker laughed.  
He stood and walked closer to Clark, looking down at him like a child looks to a broken toy. Clark couldn’t focus. The pain was unbearable. His legs wouldn’t move. His spine was shattered. His eyes fell on the television Luthor had been watching. It was a set of surveillance images from the abandoned hospital where he had just been. Luthor knew he was coming.  
“Waller...” Clark said as things began to click in his head.  
“You didn’t think I did it all myself did you? Yes, Waller, even Lawton. All for this moment,” Luthor said.  
“Well,” Joker began. “Not all! Your day may be at its end, but as for me... there’s miles to go yet,” Joker laughed again, handing the gun to Luthor. “Don’t forget your part of the deal Mr Mayor!” Joker sang out as he left the room.  
“Even in this, I needed help,” Luthor said. “I guess we all need friends sometimes... even you. But then, where are you friends when you really need them hm?” Luthor said, looking at the open window. “I don’t hear anyone...”  
“Lois...” Clark said, his body was beginning to feel cold. Blood poured freely from him, blossoming wide across the hardwood. He was losing his thoughts. Only one things kept coming back to him. “Lois...” he said again.  
Luthor watched Superman squirm in pain. Clark reached out toward the window, toward the falling snow. He called for the woman he loved.  
Even now, Luthor thought, Superman was better than he would ever be. Even as he was dying, he was thinking of the one he was leaving behind. Death was coming for Luthor and it terrified him, but Superman thought only of someone else. He thought only of Lois and the baby he would never get to meet.


	14. The Last Son of Krypton

Gotham glistened under a coat of pristine white snow. By the time Bruce had led the helicopters and drones away from Supergirl he had gone so far out to sea that it took him the entire day to return to the city. He was running on fumes.  
He watched his city below, the Batwing skimming the clouds above. The snow fell over streets and buildings, making everything quiet, like a blanket of peace, if only for one night.  
He returned to the Batcave, expecting to find Clark and Kara but there was no one. He removed his mask and made his way to the manor above. He heard the television echoing down the hall and took a deep breath of relief.   
When he entered the room, Lois sat on the couch alone, her leg bouncing up and down, nervous. She also breathed relief when she saw him, hopping to her feet and rushing to his side with a smile. “Thank God,” she said. “Where’s Clark and Kra?”  
“I... I thought they’d be here...” he said. Her smile faded.   
“It’s alright I know where he was headed, Kara did too, she went there to help...” he turned and rushed back to the batcave, knowing full well they should have returned hours ago.  
The Batmobile roared to life, its top sliding to let him in as he approached. Bruce jumped inside, the car screeched as he tore from the cave, making his way to Metropolis as fast as the car would go.  
Snow continued to shower the city. Batman watched the Mayor’s mansion from afar, his electric binoculars zooming two blocks from the ledge where he stood, scoping the home. No guards stood at their usual posts, the house was almost entirely empty, inside and out. Only one warm body showed up on his screen. Batman knew something wasn’t right but there was nothing to be done, no one else left to call. His wings spread behind him as he jumped, gliding silently through the white storm.  
Batman broke through the balcony window. The bedroom was empty. The only person in the home was down the hall straight ahead. He crossed the room-- something caught his attention. He looked to the floor. Dried blood stained the hardwood. He tapped his comms and called the police.  
He hurried out the room and sprinted down the corridor, crashing through the doors to a wide and open room at the other end.  
Bruce stopped. The man standing in the middle of the room did not turn around, he didn’t flinch at the sound of the doors breaking, he only stood there, his back to Batman. The room was dark. There was only one lamp in the entire library and it stood at the other end of the table, across from Luthor, making him no more than a silhouette.  
Luthor dipped something in a bucket on the table. Water cascaded from the table to the floor below as he continued to do whatever he was doing. Bruce could barely make it out.   
“I’ve been trying to figure out just what to say when you arrived...” Luthor said. “But there isn’t much to be said is there?” he stepped aside. Superman’s body lay on the table, his face thin, his body skeletal. Luthor had been washing the blood from Superman’s body. “His cells can’t hold the energy from the Sun so they’re deteriorating... that’s the best I can come up with.”  
Bruce approached the scene ahead, his mind lost to horror. He looked into his friend’s eyes. They were white. His mouth agape. His heart had been blown from his chest.  
“The world is on even ground now,” Luthor said. Batman wrapped his armored hand around the man’s throat and squeezed. Luthor remained perfectly still, simply taking it. His eyes rolled back as the air could no longer reach his brain. His legs grew weak beneath him.   
Bruce saw Clark holding the hand of a toddler as they toured the Kansas farm, he saw Lois and Kara laughing at the sight of father and son, big and small.   
He squeezed harder. And then, he wondered why no one was coming to stop him. Where were his security detail? Why weren’t they here?  
“You want me to kill you...” Bruce said, letting him so. Luthor tumbled to the floor, gulping air as fast as he could. Bruce thought of what had happened before this, how it all began, he thought of Harley Quinn leading Kara to a trap and the Joker being there when Dick came searching for clues. “Joker did this...” he said.  
Luthor coughed as he stood, rubbing his neck. “So close...” Luthor said. “Doesn’t matter to me, my part’s done.”   
“You would die for him?”  
“I’m dying anyway. Seemed like a fair deal. He gets me Superman, I let you take my life, and in doing so, I take your code, the very ground you stand on, the thing that separates you, from him. You have to admit, for a crazy guy in clown make-up, he’s pretty clever.”   
“Where is he?”  
“Our deal is done, I have no idea.”  
Batman pulled zip-cuffs from his belt and wrapped it around Luthor’s wrist. He tied him to the table.   
“It’s done Batman,” Luthor said, without a care that he had been caught. “One by one, you fall.”   
Bruce, ignoring Luthor, turned to the body on the table. He slipped both arms beneath Clark and took him up.   
Outside, the police were just arriving as Batman walked from the house. Their lights beat against the falling snow, making the flakes stutter in the air, as if time itself had stopped. The officers stepped from their cars, mouths open, eyes wide. The silent storm raged on, as if the sky itself had broke open above them.


	15. The Human Race

Kara sat facing the white wall, her jumpsuit hanging loose from her body, too big for her frame, on the back, numbers she couldn’t read had been stenciled in black. She seethed, trembling with rage. Behind her, the meal-slot slid open and a food tray was shoved through.   
Kara jumped to her feet and ran across the room, the contents of the tray spilled to the ground as she kicked past them, orange juice staining the floor yellow- the slot closed before she could reach. She punched the door, again and again, her knuckle bruising, cutting, bleeding as she hammered the metal, she screamed.  
Kara had lost track of time. Had she been here only days, or was it a week? The last thing she remembered was the ocean-- and then black. When she woke, she was in this room. This cell. She felt weak. Weaker than she had at Arkham, her skin was easily damaged, her arm was healing but still burned. She had no ability to fly and there was a scar in the middle of her chest, small, precise, purposeful.   
“You have to eat,” Amanda Waller’s voice filtered into the room from a speaker on the wall. Kara turned to it, her eyes on the camera in the corner.   
“Waller?” she asked the lens.  
“Eat, Kara. Our chefs are the best in the military.”  
“What do you want?”   
“I want you healthy.”  
“Why can’t I--”  
“Fly? Tear that door off its hinges? We’ve embedded a small shard of Kryptonite in your chest. It’s encased in lead, so it won’t kill you. I’m sorry but it’s for own safety,” Waller said. Kara’s hand fell over her scar. She felt a sense of violation burned through her.   
“Why?” was the only thing that came to mind.  
“We need to study you Kara, there’s a lot we can to learn from you. In case others like you fall from the sky.”  
“Where’s Superman?” Kara asked. The speaker said nothing. She remembered the Kryptonite bullets, Lex Luthor. Kal was in danger. “Where is he!?” she screamed. Silence.   
Kara ran to the tray on the floor, she kicked the slab of steak, stomped on the corn-- her throat burning as she cried out, her voice bouncing back from the walls as it had nowhere else to go.  
Laughter staggered from the speakers. Kara looked up to the camera again, all but breathing fire. Waller’s voice filled the room. “You see it now don’t you? The source our fear, our frustration... the lack of power that all people live with, the thing that says, ‘you’re not in control.’ It’s a terrifying thing to come to terms with. I sympathize. But to all woes there lies a silver lining, and this is yours. You’re one of us now. You belong. Welcome to the human race Kara Danvers.”

#

Lois watched the two army guards outside the morgue until the falling snow veiled them from view. Bruce opened the car door for her, she stepped out. It had taken three days for Bruce to get permission to come and bring her with him, and he was only granted permission when he threatened to end his support for the president’s upcoming re-election campaign. “We only have a minute once we’re inside,” he whispered. She nodded. He took her arm and led the way.  
The soldiers remained in place as they walked in, but inside more military men searched Bruce’s coat and Loi’s purse, not for weapons but for cell phones and cameras. Lois couldn’t help but feel a slight twinge of hope. She understood the need for security around a body but, maybe it was possible that they wanted the world to believe he was dead, maybe they needed Superman to explain himself before he was let out. Maybe this had something to do with Kara who was still missing. Maybe she was here. Maybe they were both under arrest.   
Once cleared, Bruce walked on, his head down, the fire of hope nowhere to be found in him. But Lois knew how the military worked, how the government worked. The secrets. The deceit. She knew they would go through any length to keep something like Superman a secret if they got the chance.   
A man in a black suit waited for them down the hall. He led them into a room with a large glass window on the wall. A curtain covered the other side of the glass. The man pressed a button. Bruce took Loi’s hand. The curtains parted.  
Clark lay on a metal slab, his skin sunk into face, his arms skinny and frail. Lois shook her head. “That’s not him,” she said. Bruce tightened the grip on her hand. “It’s not him...” she repeated, this time mostly to herself.   
“I’m sorry,” Bruce told her. She didn’t understand, how could Bruce believe it? It was so clearly not Clark, in fact the body looked almost fake, hollow, it looked like a dummy.  
Lois looked closer, more carefully, letting the details sink in. She could make out the signature curve of his bangs, the tiny birthmark on his neck, the uneven dip of his lower lip... it was him. It was really him. The love of her life, now barely more than bones.   
“He said his heart could slow down,” she told Bruce, suddenly remembering something Clark had told her long ago. “He could look dead but--”  
“His heart’s... gone...” Bruce said, barely able to get the words out. She had always thought it would be her. If either of them were to die, it would be her first. She wasn’t ready for this. She finally allowed herself to cry. Bruce held her as she sobbed. She looked to the glass again, to his empty body wondered what he would do if it had been her lying there instead of him. She wondered what he would do to the ones responsible, and vowed to do the same.


	16. Mad World

Gotham was quiet. This was not the city Bruce knew and loved. Where were the crowds, the couples, the people he had given everything to protect? Batman watched from the highest cathedral, the night was calm, the lights shimmering, a sinister picture of peace.  
Just below, tanks lined the streets, Blackhawks skated across black clouds in the distance. Fear ruled the city.  
Amanda Waller’s apartment had been cleaned out, no fingerprints, not even strands of hair had been left behind, nothing to give him any indication of where to look next. He found his hacks of the CIA were much more difficult when they didn’t want to let him in.  
He did the only other thing he could think to do. He listened to Gotham. The 911 calls, the hospital lines, anything to give him a clue as to Kara’s whereabouts. He had scoured the city with the batwing, he had beaten Joker’s old associates and still there had been nothing. But he refused to stop. Kara meant everything to Clark, he wouldn’t let her waste away in secret. He would find her and bring her back.  
“Joker’s what?” he heard a woman’s voice say as he was scanning cellphone calls from inside the hospital.  
“Property,” a guy answered. “...carved into her back.”  
“I.D?”  
“Jane Doe. But she’s got blond hair and it was up in pigtails when we found--”  
“Oh my God! Harley Quinn! You worked on Harley Quinn! You’ve touched fame!  
“She’s not that well known outside Gotham--” the man said.  
“What’s she like?”  
“Right now? Quiet. I know she’s crazy but it’s kind of sad... she’s in a lot of pain. He really messed her up.”  
“How bad?”  
“Cracked ribs, broken clavicle, cut cheek, bruises everywhere.”  
“Are the police gonna arrest her?”  
“They’ve already got the room under guard, she’s cuffed and everything, it’s crazy.”  
“She didn’t say anything the whole time you were working on her?”  
“Just one thing... when I was done I told her she was gonna be okay. She said ‘Thanks, puddin’. ” Batman clicked off the call and looked East, to Gotham General.  
Harley slept. He had never seen her so still. White bandages covered her abdomen, hints of red just below the surface. Her face was half swollen, her lip cut red. It would have been easy to hate her. For what she did to Nightwing, for framing Kara... but as she lay there, her breathing labored, her body broken, he knew he couldn’t bring himself to feel anything but pity for the once genius young doctor, now nothing more than another one of Joker’s victims.  
“Give a girl some privacy,” she said as she quietly woke. Her voice was low and hoarse. She covered her midriff with her hands.  
“Where is he?” Batman asked.  
“I ain’t gonna help you,” she told him, looking away and crossing her arms.  
“Why are you protecting him? Look at what he’s done to you.”  
“What do you care?” she said, “...At least Mistah J’s honest with me. Hurtful and mean, sure, but honest! You’re just pretending to care so I’ll take you to him. I’m not doing it. And yes it is out of spite. If you’re wondering,” she huffed.  
“I do see you as a means to get to him,” he said. Her brow furrowed, she wasn’t expecting that. She kept her eyes away from him, waiting for more. “But that’s not all I see when I look at you. I remember you from the night I brought him in. Before you were Harley Quinn. I remember you as--”  
“So what if you do? So do I, big whoop!”  
“So I know there’s more to you than petty crime and being someone’s punching bag. You worked hard to work at Arkham. You sought it out. Most young doctors avoid it like the plague. You volunteered.”  
She lowered her gaze to the floor, thinking, remembering. “...well... I wanted to challenge myself.”  
“You don’t sound like a victim. Don’t let him make you into one. Help me put him away or you’ll never be free of him.”  
She looked down to the bandages and touched her abdomen again. She nodded. “I’ll take you there. But you can’t kill him.”  
“I can’t take you with me.”  
“Fine, enjoy your evening,” she said, crossing her arms again. He said nothing but let out an involuntary sigh of frustration. She smiled and lifted her handcuffed wrists, “Got a key?”  
Batman held her as they dropped along the side of the hospital by way of his grappling hook. She pressed her face against his chest, her eyes closed tight. “Heights, my only weakness!” she whined as they sped toward the ground. “...That and vaccines.” They reached the sidewalk, she yelped when her barefeet touched the snow. “I need clothes, mine were too bloody, they threw them away. Haven’t they heard of laundry? I liked that skirt,” she winced in pain as she spoke. “Should I hail a taxi? Shouldn’t take long in this get-up,” she gestured to the hospital gown.  
“No need,” Batman said, looking down the road. A bright pair of pale blue headlights appeared around the corner, tearing toward them. The Batmobile stopped on a dime inches from Batman. The top slid forward, revealing two empty seats.  
“Shotgun!” she yelled, limping inside. He joined her. The top slid closed. “You got style,” she said, looking around the Batmobile. “...that much was never in question.”  
“Where to?” Batman asked.  
“Oh no you don’t... I’m not telling you where he is just so you can throw me out in the cold.”  
“Which way?” he asked.  
“I need new clothes didn’t I tell ya? Take me somewhere nice.”  
“It’s the middle of the night. And Martial Law’s been declared. “  
“Drat... all right, go left.”  
After several minutes of following her directions and carefully avoiding military patrols, she finally gave indication of them being close to their destination. “Just a few more feet... yes! Here, stop!”  
Batman stopped the car. He looked past her to the storefront she was staring at. Melt’s Ice Cream Parlor was written on the glass. She looked at him and clapped. “I haven’t been here since college!” she sang.  
He squeezed the steering wheel and did his best not to lose his temper. “We’re supposed to be going to Joker’s hideout.”  
“If you think I can turn on the man I love without comfort food to carry me through you’re dreaming. You want Joker? This is the price.”  
Batman looked past her again to the darkened parlor. “Five minutes,” he said, and opened the top. She squealed with glee as she tried to step out, before she could, she doubled over in pain-- Batman held his hand out to her. “Aw,” she said, taking it. “There’s more to you than punching isn’t there?”  
“I’m human if that’s what you mean,” he told her. He walked her to the storefront and let her let her lean against the glass as he took a lock-picking kit from his belt. He focused on the lock, sliding the pins inside-- a crash shook the door. Harley had thrown a garbage can through the window. She waved him in, “Monsieur,” she said, waiting for him. He turned the knob in the door and walked inside. “Oops,” she said and hopped over the broken glass, she followed him through the door.  
Batman stood still as she zipped from wall to wall, flipping every switch, lighting every sign. The military had mostly remained stationary but just to be sure he scanned every radio frequency around them, they were alone.  
He watched as she pulled open the tops on every bucket, humming a nonexistent song as she worked to scoop the nearly frozen ice cream into her cone. “Did you do it Harley?” he asked.  
“I done a lot of things,” she said.  
“Did you kill that family?”  
She stopped scooping. He could see her throat tighten, her shoulders tense up. “That was him,” she said, looking Batman in the eye. She smiled. “I was never one for blood and guts,” she continued to scoop, placing flavor atop flavor.  
She came around from behind the bar, two tall cones in her hands. She held one out for him. “Sorry I shot you with a bazooka,” she said. He took the ice cream and gave her a slight nod of thanks. “You’re not all bad B-man, it’s such a tragedy to see you waste your gifts.”  
“Waste my gifts?”  
“I mean, what are you really accomplishing? You beat people up, they go to jail, they get out, you beat them up again... what’s the point?”  
“The point is to eradicate crime. As much as possible for as long as possible.”  
“Hurting people doesn’t stop ‘em from doing what they wanna do, believe you me. Have you ever thought about it... I mean really thought about it? You put on that suit, that mask, you go out... day after day, year after year, and what have you accomplished?”  
“I think it’s time to go,” he said, putting down the uneaten ice cream.  
“You don’t love it, anyone can see that, you’re barely able to stomach it anymore, I remember you too, from that night, it was the first time I ever saw the Batman, of course I remember, and guess what? You had a lot less wrinkles around lips. It’s taking a toll. So you don’t love it... and you haven’t stopped crime, and you won’t kill, so you will never stop crime... what you do is fruitless, where’s the fruit?! So, this leaves us where?”  
“On our way,” he said, taking her by the wrist, she twisted her arm and pulled, freeing herself.  
“Can you really guarantee the people of Gotham are safe if their protector doesn’t get any psych evals? Police officers do, they have to! And so should you. But you can’t ‘cause no one knows who you are. Who can the Batman talk to? Even if there was someone, you probably wouldn’t want to admit anything to them, that’s why therapists are strangers. Well lucky for you, I just so happen to be a stranger and a therapist!” she said, hopping on a table, her legs swaying beneath her.  
“I need to find Joker. Now.”  
“Don’t worry he’ll be there, he’s probably sleeping now, beating me always takes a lot out of him... so let’s start with love, that’s really the only reason anyone does anything, to go toward love or away from it. What do you love? Other than bats capes and brooding?” she asked.  
“Why not ask that of yourself?”  
“Mistah J freed me,” she told him.  
“He hurts you. He manipulates you, he uses you.”  
“He can’t hurt me, I’m free, ain’t you listening?”  
“You’re in denial Harleen,” he said.  
“Oh yeah? And what about you? I go back to Mistah J ‘cause I love him, you go back to trying stop crime... why? We both know it ain’t for the love of it, and seeing as how you don’t kill, you know you can’t end all crime. So that means you’re not trying to end all crime...” her voice trailed as it began to dawn on her. “...no... you’re not trying to stop all crime... you’re trying to stop a crime... one that already happened...” she lifted her eyes to his. “Who are you trying to save?”  
He stared at her in silence. Then, one step at a time, he moved toward her. She slowly pulled the ice cream from her lips as he came towering above her. “Get in the car,” he growled.  
“Yes sir,” she whimpered.  
A few minutes later they pulled in front of an old shoe factory which had long since been closed and condemned. “He’s hired a lot of people to keep him safe,” she told him. Batman scanned the building. He could see a cluster of heat signals on the first floor and only one on the balcony. Joker.  
“They’re asleep,” Batman said. “I can get him out before anyone knows what happened. I can’t promise he won’t get hurt, but he’ll be alive.” The top slid open and Batman jumped out. “Wait here,” he said as it closed again.  
Inside the building, only one man snored, the sound bounced off the wall, echoing through the whole open room.  
The upstairs window shattered-- Batman glided in, moving like a missile for the sleeping man on the balcony. He rolled as he landed, grabbing the man with both hands. Green hair, white make-up smeared face, he pulled back to confirm it was the Joker. The man ahead smiled. It wasn’t him. Batman’s comms crackled with static, a voice broke through.  
“I’m sorry B-man...” Harley said, she was using the radio in the Batmobile.  
“Hi...” a voice called from below. The Joker was among his henchmen, all of whom now stood up, perfectly awake. He held something in his hand. A detonator. He clicked it. The floor blew from beneath Batman’s feet.  
He came crashing to the ground, the air pushed from his lungs as he landed on his back. The entire army of men surrounded him, baseball bats, knives, hammers, all showering down, cracking against his armor, knocking atop his head. Batman kicked and swung his fists, unsure what he was hitting.  
A few men dropped around him but more came to take their place. His mind swam as strike after strike came crashing down from above. When he couldn’t fight anymore, the men took his arms and wrapped chains around his wrists and ankles. The men laughed, and began hitting him without restraint.  
“Easy easy, the poor fellow...” Joker said. His men stopped and parted as he moved through them. Batman was on his knees, blood dripping from his mouth. He looked up to Joker, all strength drained. The clown smiled and held his arms out for a hug. “It’s been too long...”


	17. The Death of Supergirl

Kara trembled as she slept. Even in sleep she could feel herself fading away, fading to nothing, and she didn’t know what she had done to deserve it. Hands grabbed at her from the dark, her arms, legs, she woke up screaming, rattled from a nightmare into something worse. She struggled against them, kicking, pushing-- she was brought to a bright blue room and strapped to a bed. People in scrubs and medical masks stood around, waiting for her to be restrained.   
“Stop! Please!” she begged, once she couldn’t move, they surrounded her, a needled went into her arm, a tube forced down her throat. She choked, gagged, her eyes rolled back as the tube did spewed something inside her, it burned and ached, and by the time it was over she could hardly put a thought together.  
It would happen when she was awake, when she was asleep, the would come twice in an hour or not at all. She shook with anticipation, and cried as it happened. All she was had been reduced to tears and fear. She was losing not only what made her Supergirl, but also what made her Kara.  
They came again, but this time she couldn’t fight, she didn’t even try. They led her down the hall but too a left, not toward the blue room but rather to a white tiled space, shower heads hanging from above. The men who had brought her left the room. Water poured from the showerheads. She watched it, unsure of what to do. Then, she began to take her clothes off. For the first time she realized she would see her bones protruding from her ribcage. She has lost so much she didn’t even recognize her body anymore. She stepped into the shower and cried for the girl she used to be.  
She she lay on the mat in her room, trying to sleep but trembling with the fear of their coming back, she forced herself to hope. She knew Kal and Bruce would never stop looking for her, and they could trace her disappearance back to Waller. It was only a matter of time before she was rescued. She smiled at the thought of it. She was once so determined to be her own hero, to be independent and strong that the thought of being rescued would only have made her mad. But now, after losing so many, she knew there was no shame in relying on family and friends for help. She herself was going to help Kal when she was caught.   
She woke to the sound of them coming into her room again. She stood, again not fighting, but this time, she had a smile. Hold on, she thought, just hold on.  
“What’re you smiling at?” one of the men asked, she recognized him as the one who took the most pleasure in her pain.   
“I’m thinking about the day Superman comes to get me out,” she said. The men laughed.   
“She hasn’t heard...” he said. “Superman’s dead. Luthor shot him with a Kryptonite bullet.”  
Her stomach sank, she could see it in their faces, they were telling the truth. Her legs dropped beneath her. The men took her up and dragged her toward the blue room again. This time she kicked and screamed all along the hallway. Kal was her last link to family, to hope. He was the only person in the universe she knew would always be there for her, she knew him as an infant in Krypton and a man on Earth. He was her rock, the very ground she stood on, and she had failed him.  
The blue door opened and in her rage, a thought occurred to her. She wanted to them dead. All of them. She saw herself breaking her restraints and burning them all alive with her heat vision. But it wouldn’t happen because she didn’t have the power to break the bonds that strapped her to the gurney. And that’s when she realized she knew how to escape.  
Before she went into the room, she stopped fighting. The men held her tight, their arms around her arms, legs, throat. “Are you gonne be good?” the man asked. She nodded. They brought her to the blue room, calm, quiet. They put her wrists in the leather bonds, same with her feet. The men left the room as the doctors surrounded her.   
But no one had ever bothered to account for her weight loss when it came to her bonds, not even her, which meant...  
Kara pulled her arms straight back as hard as she could. Her wrists were much smaller now than when the restraints had first been put on her, she could feel them start to slip. “She’s fighting,” one doctor said. “Call them back.”  
Her right arm came loose, she grabbed the nurse with the needle by the wrist and pushed the syringe into her neck, squeezing the contents into the woman. Kara reached for the table with the instruments and grabbed the scalpel, slashing it back and forth. The nurse collapsed, the other doctors ran from the room. Kara untied herself, wrist and ankles. She could heard their booted footsteps running for the room. She stumbled from the bed, heading for the door. She closed it and turned the lock just as they reached.   
“Now what?” the man asked through the window in the door. “You’re stuck, we’ll be in there in a few minutes.”   
She fell to the floor, her back against the door, she had to think fast, this would be her only opportunity. But she couldn’t think like Kara Danvers or Supergirl. To them, this was a no way out situation, to them, she was done. She had to think as someone else. As whoever it was that she had been turning into for the last several months. She had to think like Amanda Waller.  
Kara squeezed the scalpel in her hand when she knew what she had to do. She pulled her shirt down and put the tip of the blade against the scar on her chest. She pushed it in. Blood flooded out, she screamed in agony as the blade cut through her chest plate. Sparks rained from above as the men put a torch to the door.   
She threw the scalpel as she stood, rummaging through the table of instruments until she found something, something she could use to dig the implant out, the same thing they used to put it in. It looked like a miniature pair of tongs. She took the instrument and pushed its long metal arms into her chest. She could feel it slide in, cutting through the meat, but she could also feel the implant. She reached it and and grasped it with the tongs. She pulled at it with a scream. It came out covered in blood.  
Kara threw it to the other side of the room. The door behind her fell to the floor. The men aimed their guns at her, but she could feel no twinge of Kryptonite in them. She wasn’t as strong as she had been, but she was getting there.  
“Get down!” they screamed as they inched toward her. She looked at them, the fear she had been so used to now dissolving to nothing. “I will shoot you,” the man said. She smiled. He looked down to her bloody chest. He knew.   
Kara slammed his gun down and grabbed him by the neck. The others fired. She could feel their bullets sting, but they bounced off her. She stared at the man ahead. Her eyes slowly glowed red, the energy inside her taking a moment to build.   
A stream of solar energy shot from her eyes and into his. The man screamed as the fire penetrated his ocular cavity. She dropping to the floor, just short of melting his brain. The others around her froze. “Run,” she told them. They did.  
She moved through the hall a woman restored. As the staff ran in terror, she walked, her head held high. She knew it wouldn’t be long until they gathered what they needed to bring her down, but she didn’t need long to escape. There was only one thing missing.  
She reached out and grabbed a woman with a clipboard as she ran past. “Where is it?” Kara asked.  
The woman led her to a pale white room. She used a keycard to open a thick white door on the wall. The door slid up. Supergirl’s suit stood on the other side. The coat of arms in the center had been burned, half of it now charred black. Kara stared at it, her power and rage growing simultaneously. “Take it down,” she ordered.


	18. The Joke & The Punchline

The Supergirl Renee knew and admired-- the Supergirl the world had come to love, was gone. Renee ran through the streets, the chaos of war all around her. She weaved her way past a surge of panicked pedestrians-- the tanks beside her rocking the ground beneath as they tore across the pavement, their shells exploding from their guns. Helicopters tumbled in pieces all around her, fire raining from the sky. The military fired everything they had at Kara as she flew over the city, but she wasn’t going down, though the green muzzle-flashes showed Renee that they may actually have a chance at beating her.

Renee reached the station, the police were huddled, afraid, unsure what their role was. Half the room fought with the other half. “The military is dealing with it! We can we do?!” one officer yelled.

“Our jobs!” another said, “People are getting hurt!”

“This doesn’t make sense, why would she do this?” someone asked. “Maybe it’s not really her.”

“They’re chasing her,” someone pointed out, above them, a news station showed the battle from a helicopter’s point of view, Supergirl was surrounded, she avoided the green shots as they streamed from the surrounding military Blackhawks. A bullet hit her leg from behind. The Blackhaw came in for the kill. Supergirl’s eyes went red-- a flash of orange flame took the helicopter before it scattered across the sky. “She doesn’t kill them unless she has to, is no one seeing this?” the officer said.

“It doesn’t matter,” Renee said. “People are dying, we have to take her down. We know what happened in that house... to that family.” Crispus Allen was among the crowd, he caught her eye, he lowered his gaze. “She was in Arkham for months for hurting Lois Lane, she killed that orderly... no one wants to believe that a hero can become what we’re seeing, but it’s happened, and the city’s counting on us.”

“What do we do?” Allen asked.

“We need to know what she wants,” she told him.

“She was calling for someone before the shooting started. Some woman we’ve never heard of.”

Four black SUVs came to a halt outside the station. Men in black suits poured out of them. Waller among them. They marched inside as the officers watched.

“I need to see your captain,” Waller said.

“Who are you?” Renee asked.

“We’re taking control of this station.”

“What?! Who do you work for?”

The captain rushed to their side, giving his hand and shaking hers. “I’ve spoken with the commissioner, he’s not happy about it but... we’re at your disposal,” the captain said. Renee didn’t understand but she was willing to listen.

“We’re gonna need access to your arsenal. Luthor gave you liquid Kryptonite bullets, you’re the closest station to carry it.”

“Doesn’t the military have it?” Renee asked.

“He was planning on it but it takes time, or so I’m told. What we have if far less effective.”

“What’s the plan?”

“Set up around at the buildings with a clear shot of Wayne Tower. I’ll wait on the roof, she’ll come to me. I need your best snipers, and tell ‘em to be fast, we’re not gonna exchange a whole of pleasantries before she vaporizes me.”

“You’re bait?” Renee asked.

“Won’t be the first time,” Waller told her. The captain barked at the others to call for SWAT. Renee turned to the officers behind her. “Kryptonite bullets,” she told them. They switched their magazines. Renee already had the green striped bullets in her gun.

“I’d like to stay with you,” said Renee.

“I have plenty of protection,” Waller said.

“I’d like to be there. I want to make sure she’s taken down.” Waller watched her, then nodded.

“Stay back, stay out of sight,” Waller said.

“She’s gone!” One of the officers said, pointing to the TV. Supergirl was nowhere to be found.

“She’ll come back when I show myself,” Waller said. “Let’s go.”

#

Batman hung by the arms, his wrists over his head, his legs limp beneath him. He couldn’t quite sleep but he wasn’t entirely awake. Something pulled at him. He opened his eyes. One of the Joker’s men was trying to get his mask off.

A hand came quietly from behind the man, around his neck, a blade between the fingers. The knife cut the man’s throat, his eyes bulged, he didn’t know what had happened or why. He fell, dying as he choked in blood. The Joker stood in front of Batman, wiping the blade on his sleeve, smiling as he put it away. “Take him away before he starts to stink the place up,” Joker said. A few of his men came and took the still living man away.

“But sir,” another man said. “Shouldn’t we know who he is?”

“We do know who he is...” Joker said, “...he’s the Batman...”

“What do you want?” Batman asked.

“How many times are you gonna ask me the same thing? You know how they say insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results? Well... they’re wrong, trust me, but still, it’s very annoying... I’ve told you what I want, I’ve told you a thousand different times in a thousand different ways...”

“To see me smile.”

“Now is that such a bad thing?”

“You killed her friends... her family,” Batman said.

“All for you! I can’t kill your super-friends! Breaking them is the best I can hope for, then maybe, when you see what becomes of them, what becomes of any of us who have it all taken away, maybe you’ll see things my way.”

“You’re nothing to me.”

“You’re so locked in that cage of a mind, that prison you call sanity-- that you can’t see the world for what it is, but hey, I can’t fault you for that, a man sees what he needs to see to keep the illusion going... but the truth is you see things through roooose colored glasses. I see the world through a clear lense, free of optimism... I see atoms smashing into one another! I see supernovas, an endless void and fireballs in the place of stars and sky, I see the utter absurdity of our lives and the futility of helping people today, who will hurt others tomorrow! My best chance to break you out of your cage is to make you like me... only then will he be happy. Only then will you be free! And so that’s what I’ve been doing, it’s taken a long time, I had to align myself with some pretty unsavory people and a lot of lives were lost, so don’t let it be in vain, I’m giving you a gift!”

“You’re going back to Arkham,” Batman said.

“Oh I can’t be imprisoned, a warehouse, Blackgate, Arkham, it’s all the same to me! You’re the one in prison... you think you have some kind of control over what’s going to happen, don’t you see how sad that is? All you’ve built, I’ve taken! And I’ll take more!” he laughed and snapped his fingers. Two of his men carried a TV with rabbit ears on top. “The truth is... well, it’s as I’ve always said really, you’re all just one bad day away from becoming me... even gods.” He turned on the TV.

Static hissed, the picture faded into view. Supergirl hovered in the sky, her eyes red, helicopters burning in the streets beneath her. “This is a just a replay... she’s taking a break,” Joker said, turning to Batman. “But trust me, she’s coming back, she doesn’t have what she wants just yet...” he pointed to the TV again, a new shot, a live shot. Amanda Waller at the roof of Wayne Tower.

“Harley!” Joker called. Harley came into view, still limping from the pain. She carried a small purple box wrapped in a green bow. “What could it be?” Joker said. “I wonder, I wonder...” he took the box and held it up by Batman’s face. “It’s for you...” he smiled and opened the box.

Batman looked inside. It was a long metal key. “Today, you find out, that control... is the joke,” Joker said taking the key from the box. “...And chaos, is the punchline.” He slipped the key into the lock holding Batman’s wrists and click it open. Batman nearly fell, but managed to stay upright. One of Joker’s men jogged up to Batman holding out his utility belt. The others watched, Harley Quinn hid behind the Joker who held a half smile, waiting for Batman to act. Batman put on the belt and looked back to the TV, to Kara, hopelessly enraged, and Waller, waiting for her to attack. Batman took out his grappling hook, aiming to the second floor window.

The joker burst out in a mad laugh. Batman shot the hook and zipped up and out of the building. Even as he got into the Batmobile outside he could hear the Joker laughing.


	19. War

Gotham burned. Pillars of black smoke sprouted between skyscrapers, snaking free toward the sky. Tanks remained still. Blackhawks were grounded. On the television, the news showed boy-bags being carried to a school gym. There were laid out in rows, an improvised space for the dead. Outside, soldiers without orders sat on sidewalks, some stared blankly ahead as they smoked cigarettes, others wept.  
Kara watched the silent tanks, the sitting soldiers. She looked down at them from one of the highest buildings in the city, a building which had been evacuated when the fighting began. Now she was alone among the cubicles and computers, the family photos and name-plates. It reminded her of what she had always wanted, and knew she could never have, a normal life. A sense of belonging. What little she had of that life was gone, and after what happened today, it wasn’t coming back.  
“That’s the same look you had when I first met you, just after you arrived,” Batman said. She was surprised by his presence but didn’t show it. She was happy to see him.   
“You remember?” she asked. Bruce removed his mask. She turned melancholy eyes to him.  
“Of course. Clark was so scared.”  
“Scared?”  
“To him it was like he became a father to a young woman all at once. I told him you were old enough to care for yourself, and you had a loving family to watch you. But he wouldn’t drop it, he kept talking about how hard things were for him growing up and that for you, who remembered Krypton, who remembered everything that happened and all that you lost... not to mention all the changes you were gonna experience and what that meant... he said you might never recover, you would need constant attention. He was ready to give up everything to do that for you. To be there. And then... you adjusted. You dealt with it. You grew up.” Bruce walked up to her, he laid his hand on her shoulder. “He was so proud of you,” he said, she broke down in tears before he could finish the words. He hugged her, his own eyes swelling.  
“How did you find me?” she asked.  
“You’re not gonna like it...” he said. She laughed.   
“Another of your creepy ways to keep track of us dangerous aliens?” she asked. He half shrugged, yes.   
“Kryptonians have very a specific radiation signature. Speaking of which, where have you been? I searched all over.”  
“Waller had me in some facility... they hurt me,” she said, looking down, as if embarrassed. Bruce’s jaw locked.   
“We’ll take her in together,” he said.  
“She’s the reason he’s dead... she’s the reason I...” she stopped herself. She looked out to the smoking Gotham outside. “I wasn’t trying to hurt them but they wouldn’t stop...”  
“Why didn’t you fly away?”  
“Because I’m not letting her get away with it! Or the Joker or Luthor--”  
“The Joker’s been arrested. He had me, he let me go. I called it in, GCPD used a few soldiers to surround them. They took him and his men in half an hour ago. He didn’t even try to run. And Luthor has cancer. He’s dying.”  
“Then it’s just her,” she said, moving to the TV mounted on the wall. Waller stood on the roof, waiting for her.  
“I’ll bring her in,” he said.  
“She’s CIA. No one’s going to arrest her,” Kara said. “And I’m a fugitive remember... even if I wanted to tell them what she did to me, I’d still be arrested... there’s no other way,” she said, her focus absolute.  
“They have every surrounding building loaded with snipers. It’s a trap, you have to know that.”   
“I do,” she said. “Stay here,” her voice was gentle and yet, he knew it was a warning. She marched out to the balcony. He followed.   
“She’s not worth it,” he said.   
“She can’t get away with it! That’s what would happen if we let them take her. They took everything from me! She tortured me! They killed Kal, there’s nothing left.. stay here Bruce. I don’t want to hurt you.” She looked to the sky, the air vibrated as it always did just before she took off flying. Bruce moved up to sher-- she pushed him back, he was thrown to the barrier, his back smashing a dent against it. He stared at her... she looked back to the sky and with a bang, she was gone.  
Bruce remained on his back, a chilled wind crept over him. Though the impact had hurt, that was not the reason he refrained from moving in the moment. He knew that when he got up, he would have to go after Kara, go to war, and someone wouldn’t make it back.  
Finally, he stood. Bruce slipped the mask back over his face. He called the Batwing which had been hovering over the roof, it now came to a stop above him. The belly opened and he grappled inside.  
All eyes turned up, first supergirl cut across the white sky, a few minutes later the batwing followed, both speeding toward Wayner Tower where Waller stood waiting. Gotham watched in silence, soldiers and police looking up from the streets, most other residents in rushing to basements, crowded bars, lobbies, wherever they were, they gathered, as there was very little else they could do.   
Tanks surrounded the building, their guns turned up. Once Supergirl was in sight, the Blackhawks came like wasps. The pale clouds grew grayer as the sun began its descent.   
Supergirl reached her destination. She looked down to Waller who now seemed so small, so insignificant, that her anger nearly gave way at the sight of her. And then Kara remembered her cousin, she remembered Lois and thought of her raising a fatherless child, she remembered her mother. The fire, the blood. Her own torture.  
“Put her down,” Waller said.  
The silence was broken by the thundering booms of the helicopters unleashing an array of green bullets across the air. Snipers in nearby buildings also let loose, Kara shot up, disappearing in the clouds, but not before taking note of all their positions.   
“Eyes open, anyone got her?” a pilot asked.  
“Going thermal,” someone responded. Every man in every helicopter slid their thermal vision over their eyes and looked up. The night sky was blue through the glasses, a small red stain grew hotter and hotter in the clouds above. “There!” one soldier yelled. “Break break!” the pilots commended, the Blackhawks broke formation-- Supergirl tore from the sky like a meteor, her eyes shot red cutting the tail off one of the helicopters in the middle of the formation. Before it lost altitude she fell stop another chopper, its propellers tearing off as they came into contact with her. She pushed it down, the men inside screaming-- and let it drop from a safe distance over the street.   
Supergirl swooped up from below and came back, taking the falling helicopter by its landing skids. If she were shot they copter would fall, the others had no choice but let her bring it safely to the ground.  
The tank’s guns followed her as she slowly brought the Blackhawk to rest. The men inside ran off. She rose behind the chopper, before the tanks could fire she blew a hurricane of frozen breath over them, making their instruments lose power and their guns unable to fire.  
Supergirl heard the remaining Blackhawks being called back by General Lane who saw that this was a losing fight. “Get the snipers out and get Waller off that roof, this ain’t the way to do this,” he ordered.  
Supergirl crashed into the closest building, taking temporary shelter as she used her X-ray vision to see if his orders were being followed. The snipers retreated, the helicopters flew out of sight. Waller and someone else were making their way to the stairwell. Kara ripped through the glass window and flew to Wayne Tower stairwell-- cracking through the wall. Supergirl stepped from the blossom of white dust, face to face with Amanda Waller.


	20. Batman V Supergirl

Amanda Waller stumbled backward up the stairs, behind her, Renee did the same until they were both back on the roof. “Go,” Supergirl told Renee, Waller nodded. Renee waited, thinking, then, she left.   
“Well,” Waller said. “...at least I’ll know I was right to be afraid of you.”  
“You made this happen. You had no reason to be afraid of me or Superman.”  
“Tell me something, how many worlds are out there?” Waller asked, tilting her chin to the sky.  
“Thousands... hundreds of thousands,” Kara responded.  
“Are they all peaceful?”  
“No.”  
“The only way to protect yourself from what you don't know anything about, is to study it.”  
“You didn’t have to kill him.”  
“Lex wouldn’t have it any other way. And I only needed one of you.”  
“He was good!” Kara screamed, storming close to Waller who fell to the floor in fear. “He hurt no one!”   
“His existence meant we weren’t in control-- we had no say. He could choose to follow our laws or ignore them, he could choose to level cities, start wars--  
“He never did any of that! He never would!”  
“He could choose to go into a jail and walk out with a suspect,” Waller said, her focus unrelenting. Kara towered over her.  
“You killed him... my family... just so you could feel in control...”  
“Yes,” Waller said. Kara’s eyes went red. Waller could feel the heat coming off of them even from this distance, like a sitting too close to a bonfire.  
“You should have killed me,” Kara said.  
“Yes,” Waller agreed. Kara’s eyes grew too bright to look at-- a red stream of shot out, Waller looked away. But there was no pain. She turned back. Batman stood like as a sentry in a silver suit made of metal armor. Waller could see the Batwing hovering over the roof, he had jumped down and taken the blast of heat in his chest. The suit smoked, his fists were clenched in pain from the heat, but he was still standing.  
“Get out of the way,” Supergirl ordered.   
“Waller, run,” Bruce said. Waller stood and ran to the door.   
“You’ve tried the suit before,” Kara said. “It didn’t work.”  
“That was for sparring,” he told her. “I’m sorry,” he said, a Kryptonite blade shot from the metal sleeve of his arm, he rammed it into her side as she swung a fist at him, her arm lost its strength before it struck. He pulled the blade back, making sure to miss any organs, he knew that leaving it in could kill her, he gave it a quick twist to knock her down, Kara fell to her knees. A red curtain of blood poured from the wound. “She’s gone,” he said. “...they’ll pick her up, she’ll disappear, this is over, forget--”   
She used all the energy left in her body to summon the last of her heat vision and trained it on his hand. The blast smashed against the green blade which went flying off and vanished behind the ledge. Bruce pulled the overheated metal gauntlet off his hand, his skin blistering as it burned. Kara felt her power begin to restore. She flew into the air, a moment later she crashed down with both fists falling on Bruce’s chest.  
She knew he had more tricks, she reached around his back before he could recover from the blow and dug her fingers into a mechanism she could hear but not see, the thing that made it possible for him to move the arms and legs-- she put her hands around it and pulled. His movement ceased. He was breathing, but now he was buried under a ton of steel and lead.   
“Kara... please,” he said.  
Through the floor she could see Waller running down the stairs, Renee just ahead. Supergirl cocked her arm back and hammered it down on the floor, breaking a hole into the roof of Wayne Tower. She flew into it like a missile, tearing through each floor until she reached Waller, once again appearing in front of her amidst dust and rubble.  
“You know what you’ve done don’t you?” Amanda Waller asked. “You’ve ended the era of trust between heroes and humans. It’s over.”  
Kara took Waller by the neck, all that she once was now collapsing in a turmoil of rage and vengeance. Kara Danvers was dead. A shadow of what was now stood in her place. Her fingers began to tighten. Waller couldn’t speak, couldn’t breathe. One more second and she would be gone.  
Something stung Kara from behind. Waller dropped from her hand, alive. Kara’s insides burned. Her legs grew weak. She fell against the wall, blood spilling not only from the stab wound she had suffered but now, a few inches above it. Kara fell to her knees.  
She looked behind her. Renee’s gun was still smoking.  
“I went to see Mr. Luthor,” Renee said. “I asked for something stronger... I asked for what killed Superman.” Renee looked down at Supergirl, assured that she was right. The world needed her to do what she was about to do. After everything she had seen, after what Supergirl was just about to do to Waller... “Go,” she told Waller. The woman stood, rubbing her neck.  
“I’ll tell them you saved me,” Waller said and walked past her, making her way down the stairs.   
“Do it,” Kara said quietly. Renee hesitated, then squeezed the t--  
“Stop!” Batman shouted from the landing above. He was no longer in his metal suit, and just barely able to move, blood ran down his cowl, his hand was burnt, he was out of breath, covered in sweat, on the verge of collapse. He had no fight left.   
“I have to. She’s too dangerous.” Renee aimed the gun at Supergirl’s head. Kara closed her eyes. A bang rocked through the room, the sound bouncing up and down the stairwell.   
Supergirl opened her eyes. Renee was pinned to the wall, Batman’s grappling hook nailed through her chest. Bruce lay defeated, his eyes filled with sorrow. His head fell back as he lost consciousness.   
Kara turned her eyes to her abdomen. She could feel the liquid Kryptonite soaking into her skin, into her organs. She pushed herself up against the wall, her hands trembling, blood dripping beneath her.   
She moved to Bruce, picking him up and throwing his arm over her shoulders. Before climbing up to the roof and to the Batwing, she looked to Renee, her limp body hanging against the wall. She realized what he had done for her, and she knew what it meant.


	21. Fallen

Bruce sat at the foot of the empty bed, the disheveled sheets and scattered clothes a reminder of the occupant who had recently left after only one day of rest. He wondered where she would go, what she would do. He had tried to give her some cash but she refused to take it, so he transferred money directly into her account.   
Bruce looked to the mirror standing on the open closet door just ahead, he was in his black suit and dress shoes, his hair combed, his face shaved, he had been ready to go for hours but he couldn’t make himself walk out the door.  
The bell rang. When he opened the door he found Lois also dressed in black. “I’m sorry, I couldn’t,” he said. She walked in, surveying the large empty home.  
“You’ve been to enough funerals,” she said. “It’s okay. Besides, I wasn’t sure I could explain how Bruce Wayne knew Clark Kent. Where’s Kara?”  
“Took off this morning.” They remained there in silence for a moment. “Coffee?” he asked, she nodded and followed him to the kitchen.  
“I didn’t know billionaires could brew their own coffee.”  
“Alfred taught me. He said if I can beat up bad guys I could learn this,” he said giving her a cup. She took a sip and winced. “Yeah he was wrong about that,” he said.   
She put the cup down. “I don’t like you here all alone,” she said.  
“This was always what was going to happen. Clark was lucky to have you.”   
She smiled at the comment but he could see she was holding back tears. The fact that she was able to go to the funeral of the man she loved, then come here to check on his best friend told him all he needed to know about Lois Lane, the only person who would come back from all this relatively the same as she went into it, it told him she was the strongest person he had ever known. “...have you done the other thing?” she asked.  
“Couldn’t do that either,” he said. She took his arm and they moved to the library where he pulled at the candle holder and a combination of books. The shelf slid open. He led her down to the Batcave.  
“Are you sure you really want to?” she asked. He opened the vault where the Batsuit resided.  
“I killed someone. A cop. Her name was Renee Montaya and she thought she was doing what was right. I’m no different than any of them anymore.”  
“You had to,” she said. “To save Kara.”  
“And now I know if I have to kill, I will, and that’s not what Batman is, it can’t be.”   
Lois moved beside him, both looking at the empty suit ahead. “Maybe it’s not batman, but it is human, and I understand.”   
He took the suit down and mounted it on a glass encasement, the fourth suit added to the row of retired heroes. “You did a lot of good,” Lois said.   
“I’m not sure I feel the difference. Out there.”  
“I do,” she said. “Gotham does.” She took his hand. He studied the suit, his identity, his home. He couldn’t help but wonder what it would be like to have to wear the mask of Bruce Wayne all the time. 

#

“You were never here,” the man told Kara as he handed her the envelope. She nodded and walked out from the back of his shop to the busy city street. She had spent nearly half the money Bruce had transferred to her account on this one purchase, but it was worth it. She looked inside the envelope; a passport, driver's license, social security card, even a resume’, a whole new identity.   
The glass of the storefront ahead reflected someone she barely recognized, not only because of her newly dyed-brown hair, but because of the eyes. They were no longer the eyes of the optimistic young superhero that little girls looked up to and men respected. Something had changed in her, something fundamental.   
“Miss Ryan?” the receptionist called. Kara didn’t turn, she sat on the bench in the waiting area just outside the office, her focus on the window, lost in thought. “Miss Ryan,” the receptionist said again. Kara looked at the woman, it was the first time someone used her new name to address her. “She’ll see you now.”  
Kara stood, following the woman across the office floor. Phones rang, people chatted and laughed with their coworkers. Desks and photographs, conversations and coffee; a normal life. She took a deep breath and smiled.

#

Lois handed her purse to the guard outside the hospital room. The man rummaged through its contents, of course there was no weapon, but he did find her digital recorder. “No recording devices, you’ll have to leave your phone as well.”  
“Hang on to the bag,” she said, throwing her phone inside. The man put the purse down on the chair and opened the hospital room door for her. He had to move entirely out of the way so she could fit through the frame, her belly now home to a baby thirty weeks along and growing. Lois stepped inside.  
He looked worse than she had imagined. He had maybe a few days left. The air had a smell of a tart cleaning product which tried but failed to mask the other odors in the room, namely that of feces and urine. She moved up to his bed, dragging the wooden chair across the floor so she could sit beside him.   
Luthor’s eyes were open, he stared at the ceiling though the television was on. “Hello Mr. Mayor,” Lois said. She found it hard to hate him at this state, even after what he had done to Clark, looking at him now, she felt as if he was already getting all he deserved.  
“Lois Lane...” he whispered from beneath his oxygen mask.   
“Yes,” she smiled, resting a hand on her belly. His eyes widened when he saw it. “I’m afraid you weren’t entirely successful in ridding the world of Superman,” she said.  
At first he seemed shocked, even afraid, but then, he smiled, “The clown was right, control is an illusion.”  
“At times, yes. But right now, I would like to think we have the ability to control one thing... we can determine what happens to the people who were involved in Superman’s death. You’re dying, but they, the others, they live on...” she said, looking him in the eye. “And I can’t have that.”  
“I only wanted to hurt him. No one else. I’m sorry you got caught in the middle.”  
“My child will grow up without a father because of what you did. You owe me, which is why you’re going to help me.”  
“You want the clown killed?”  
“He’s at Arkham, let him rot. But the others, I want you to kill them for me.”  
“Why would I? There are always casualties in war, I’m one of them.”  
“You’re going to help me because you don’t realize what you did, but that’s why I’m here. To show you your mistakes… you killed Superman because you thought he had too much, too much power, that much you’ve always been upfront about. But the people who helped you did so because they wanted to be more powerful than superman, and now, they are. The thing you feared him to be, that is what they’ve become. Without him, without Batman and Superigirl to stop them, their power will only grow; their influence will be unlimited. And you made it happen.”   
“Waller,” Luthor said.   
“Yes.”  
Luthor watched Lois. He raised his hand, pointing a closet in the corner of the room. Lois made her way to it. She looked inside and found a phone. She took it and brought it to him. He found a contact, someone she couldn’t see and started texting: W A L L--   
“Everyone,” Lois said. “Anyone who took part in his death.” Luthor nodded, he continued typing. Lois looked at the final message, two names, Waller was the first, and the second she didn’t recognize; LAWTON.  
“Thank you,” she said. He gave her a slight nod.  
Lois left the room, taking her purse on the way out, she rested her hand on her belly as she moved down the corridor, making her way to the empty elevator. The baby kicked when she got inside. “Shh, it’s alright now.”

#

The old guard moved through the corridor, looking at each resident as he passed their doors. He had worked here for many years and never had the halls of Arkham been so silent while the Joker lived there. As he approached Joker’s room, he looked inside and found him sitting up in his bed, quietly looking at the wall ahead.   
“Hey,” he said. The Joker turned only slightly, he said nothing, but he was listening. “How come you never laugh anymore?”   
The question was met with a long silence, the guard wasn’t sure he had been heard, then the Joker spoke. “The world’s no fun anymore,” he said. “What’s there to laugh about?”

The End

 

*Thanks for reading, please let me know what you thought!


End file.
